


Spree

by uisceB



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Humor, Romance, Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-12
Updated: 2018-02-05
Packaged: 2019-02-13 19:27:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12990915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uisceB/pseuds/uisceB
Summary: Agent ReignSam keeps waking up at the scene of numerous gruesome murders, unaware of her nighttime killing sprees as Reign.Alex keeps showing up to solve these gruesome murders, and wonders what that nice soccer mom is doing around these parts.Canon compliant Agent Reign





	1. The Pile on the Pier

**Author's Note:**

> So this one’s gonna weave in and out of the canon world—follows canon pretty close up to 3x07/3x09, except I’ve erased the existence of Mon-El altogether, and paired Kara up with Lena, as is right and proper. Everything else up till the mid-season finale is more or less the same.

 

On Tuesday the 5th of December at approximately 8:15ish in the morning, Sam awoke to several questions. 

The first question was why was she so cold? That answered itself quickly enough—she was cold because she was lying curled up on the pier in downtown National City. Of course that answer led to the next question, which was, why was she on the pier? That question remained unanswered for the moment, but she did have to wonder if it had anything to do with the fact that there was a pile of dead bodies no more than a few feet from her.

That wasn’t so bad, she thought blearily, as she raised her head, squinting to make sure she was, in fact, seeing bodies. Yes she was. Five in one pile, another three strewn out next to them, and two broken and dangling over the edge of the dock where their fingers drifted against the surface of the water every time the pier shifted above the waves.

Well, it was a little bit bad, Sam corrected herself. But her dreams of late had consisted of significantly more bodies, sometimes ripped apart, sometimes in flames, always with frozen looks of terror twisting their faces.

So this was still an unpleasant dream, but she’d had worse.

What she _hadn’t_ had, was this incredibly realistic setting. Most of her dreams lately had been more abstract—hundreds of bodies, violence like she’d never imagined…but at least it was still in a dreamlike world. The colors would swirl, the images would stretch and collapse on themselves, twists in the pit of her stomach would send her spiraling down—and then she would jolt awake in her bed. Sweating and terrified, sure—sometimes even screaming. But this right now…it just seemed _so real._ She could feel the slats of the pier beneath her, the splintery wood pressing into her cheek, the ache of her shoulder from being trapped under her body. She could taste the dryness of her mouth, she could smell…

God, what was she smelling? Salty ocean air, the dank wood beneath her…and something much more putrid. She blinked, eyes fixating back on the pile of bodies. She counted them. Five in a pile. Three strewn out. Two hanging over the edge.

The same as before.

Her dreams never kept track of numbers.

She jolted upright at the sound of sirens wailing in the distance. They were so loud—why was everything _so loud all of a sudden?_ No, she didn’t like this dream at all. This was worse, this was much, much worse than the others. Its consistency, its stillness—her dreams were never _still_ like this. People died in her dreams, they were never dead already. They never looked this way, never stayed this way, never smelled this way…

It hit her like a slug to the gut. This wasn’t a dream.

It seemed real because it was real.

Clutching her stomach against a dizzying pull of sickness, she tried desperately to wrangle her memories of last night. How the hell had she gotten here—had she sleepwalked? And if these men had been attacked, why was she still alive? Did she get here after it happened?

Her thoughts tumbled over each other, only managing to tangle themselves further. She had no memory of this, she had no idea how she’d gotten here…

Sickness jolted through her again, sudden, and enough to make her start to shake. If she was out here, where was Ruby?

Pushing every other thought from her head, she sprang into a run, shaky legs carrying her faster than she’d imagined possible toward home.

*

“Heyyyyy, got some fun neeeewwws for everybody!”

Alex cringed at the sound of Winn’s overly-cheerful drawl as he called everyone’s attention over to the control room of the DEO. “Fun news” from Winn usually meant hours of physical grunt work for Alex that would turn into piles of paperwork at night, which would often spill over into the early hours of the morning. And Winn new that. But he still insisted on using that… _tone._  

Alex frequently wished he were a field agent so she could kick his ass in the training ring for a little bit, but such was the privilege of being the tech guy. The only opportunity Alex ever had to smack him was when he would fuck up their chances of beating Kara and Lena at charades on game nights, and that just wasn’t nearly often enough.

On the other hand, every so often, Winn’s announcement of “fun news” actually did mean something _fun_ like a real mission to go on, or the capture of a new hostile species Alex might have the chance to study. If anyone asked, she would answer that kicking ass and taking names was her favorite part of the job, but really, long nights in the lab analyzing samples taken from hostiles, from crime scenes…those were her favorites. 

She also kind of liked studying the insides of hostiles that had been killed.

…And that last part was exactly _why_ she didn’t tell people that that was her favorite part of the job. Sounded a little morbid, even in her own head.

Today was looking like more of a grunt work day, though, as Winn laid out the situation.

“Ten gang banger dudes,” he said, holding up what was actually five fingers as his other hand was busy holding onto his iPad. “All found on the pier, dead as a friggerzoid. Cops first thought it was just a turf war, _but—_ the wounds they’re describing indicate the source as something maybe comparable to heat vision, which is fun. Supergirl, you might get to have a new playmate, eh?”

Alex glanced at Kara out of the corner of her eye to find her sister affording Winn some kind of imitation smile. He must have caught onto that imitation feel as well, because he cleared his throat awkwardly before continuing.

“So. Anyway. I’m thinking…we should probably go check that one out. What say you, Papa Bear?”

J’onn’s face remained fairly placid at the query, but there was definitely a dangerous spark in his eyes at the slip. He couldn’t stop Winn from calling him Papa Bear after hours, but at work in front of the rest of the agents…Alex was interested to see if Winn would still have his job tomorrow. Or all of his limbs. Definitely not the wisest of his decisions.

“I’m going to assume you meant to say ‘Director J’onzz’ and move on from there,” J’onn said sternly. He turned to the rest of them. “Supergirl, I’d like you to go survey the site where the murders took place, see what you can find to go off of. Agent Danvers, I’d like you to come with me to the morgue, see what you can make of the bodies.”

A morgue day? Examining dead _humans?_ Alex hadn’t had a day like this in years. 

And she should most _definitely_ not feel as excited about it as she did currently.

“Agent Schott, I want you on the comms in case Supergirl is in need of backup,” J’onn finished up with. “Everyone clear?”

“Clear,” they all murmured obediently.

“Oh, and Agent Schott,” J’onn added, calling Winn over with a crook of his finger. He placed a large hand on Winn’s shoulder. “If you ever happen to be tempted to call me anything other than Director J’onzz in front of the rest of my agents again, I will place you in a containment cell and invite Agent Danvers to do what she will with you. Understand?”

Winn shot a nervous look at Alex, and nodded quickly.

“Good,” J’onn said, satisfied with his look of terror. He pointed at Alex. “Agent Danvers, if you’ll go change, I’ll meet you outside,” he said.

Alex nodded affirmatively, and made her way toward the locker rooms.

She looked behind herself as she heard Kara trotting up behind her, apparently deciding she needed an escort. 

“What’s up?” Alex asked a little warily.

“Nothing,” Kara said. “I’m just surprised you aren’t jumping up and down with joy at getting to go poke apart dead bodies.”

Alex rolled her eyes. Alright, _Kara_ knew that was her favorite part of the job, but after this long, she guessed there was no real hiding _anything_ from her.

“I don’t _poke apart_ dead bodies,” she said. “Probably all I’ll be doing is taking a few tissue samples, nothing fancy.”

“Still,” Kara said. “Isn’t that the thing that makes you all giddy and weird? Where’d your morbid joy go?”

“It’s here,” Alex assured her. “I just want to make sure I get out of here on time today. Sam called earlier this week and…”

Kara grabbed her arm abruptly with a dramatic gasp. _“Sam?”_ she squealed. “Oh my god, are you finally—“

“—babysitting Ruby? Yes,” Alex said, cutting off what she knew was going to be an extremely annoying fake swoon from Kara. “Sam’s got a meeting with your girlfriend later, and she needed me to look after her.”

“Riiiight,” Kara said. “And then when Ruby falls asleep and Sam comes home…” she started circling her hands in a dance accompanied by a sly, “Bow chicka bow-wow.”

“Kara, we’ve been over this,” Alex said, rounding the corner to the locker rooms. “I don’t _like_ Sam. I mean, I like Sam, y’know, as a smart, accomplished, interesting human being, but I don’t…”

“Alex, do you see this?” Kara interrupted her, holding up her cape for Alex to examine.

“Yes…?”

“This is the color your face turned last week when Sam told you she liked your jacket. I know I’m not a human, but I think I’ve lived around you guys long enough to know that this is not a color most humans are unless they’ve been sitting out in the sun for like three days straight.” She leaned in close. “… _Or if they really like someone,”_ she added in a conspiratorial whisper.

“Alright, I am officially ignoring you so I can go meet J’onn and poke at dead people,” Alex said, opening her locker and pulling out slacks and a blouse rather than a uniform that suggested she frequently leapt out of buildings to battle rogue aliens.

“Alex and Saaam, sittin’ in a tree,” Kara sing-songed as she skip-hopped backward toward the door. “K-I-S-S-I-N— _ow!”_

Alex knew it hadn’t actually hurt her Kryptonian sister, but it was still satisfying to throw her shoe at her head anyway.

*

Sam jumped at the sound of her doorbell ringing, jerking her hand so that the eyeliner she was applying angled right up the corner of her eye all the way to her hairline.

Fantastic.

“Mom! Alex is here!” Ruby called from the living room.

“Can you let her in, babe?” Sam called back, grabbing a tissue to try to wipe away the mess she’d just made of her face. God, she was still so jumpy. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

She took a deep breath, staring herself down in the mirror. Her hands hadn’t really stopped shaking since this morning, even after returning home to find Ruby safe and sound in her bed. Part of her still wasn’t sure what she’d seen, if it was real. The sleepwalking part…she was pretty sure that was real. Ending up on the pier, she was pretty sure that was real too; she had all the aches and pains she’d expect to accompany sleeping on a wooden dock. She also retained a deep chill to her bones she could only trace back to having spent so long outside. 

She wasn’t sure about the rest of it, though. She hadn’t been sleeping well lately—as clearly evidenced by this sleepwalking episode she was going to need to do something about. Long hours at the office, that news station constantly playing above her desk—she remembered last night before leaving the office, there had been some news story about a rise in gang activity lately. Maybe that had fused somehow with her dreams…she’d run home this morning and upon finding Ruby snuggled safe in her bed, had collapsed next to her, holding her tight to her chest, and passing out into a blessedly dreamless sleep for most of the day.

When she’d woken up, it was to Ruby prodding her shoulder, reminding her that she was supposed to be meeting with Lena in an hour. Groggy and disoriented, Sam had raced around to get herself ready in time. Lena was her friend, but she was also her boss, and their conference would be attended by several board members she didn’t get along with particularly well. She’d practically leapt into the shower, scrubbing all that grogginess and confusion from herself, and by the time she got out, she had almost convinced herself that the horrific scene she had woken up to this morning was nothing more than a hallucination brought on by a shit sleep schedule, and watching too much of the news.

It didn’t account for the way her hands were still shaking, though. But that didn’t matter. That was something she was going to need to put from her mind, at least for now, hopefully forever. She’d been preparing for this conference for weeks, and Lena was depending on her. Once this was over, she’d have at least a couple days of down time. Maybe she could get her sleep schedule back on track and stop having these horrific nightmares.

She was going to have to look into the sleepwalking, though. Maybe that had been part of her hallucination too, but she didn’t think so. The last thing she wanted to do was have to go to a doctor of any kind, but if this was a thing now…better nip it in the bud. She’d seen enough horror movies to find the whole notion of sleepwalking to be terrifying.

 _“Mom!”_ Ruby called again, sounding just this side of exasperated. 

Right. Conference. Lena. Predictably unpleasant board members. Inane arguments and sleazeball attempts to get under Lena’s skin. Sam always ended up playing guard dog just as much as she played CFO, snarling after anyone who was trying to go after Lena’s business, or Lena’s already somewhat precarious sense of self-worth.

Meetings like these were exhausting on several fronts. She needed to get into that headspace.

Running her fingers through her hair one more time, she turned and made her way to the living room.

Alex was already on the couch with Ruby, and Ruby was showing her something on her phone—a game, or a video or something. She took a moment to take the scene in, finding herself very suddenly much calmer as her gaze settled on the way Ruby was chattering animatedly at Alex, and Alex was hanging on every word, as if it were the most important story in the history of the world. For a brief second, Sam felt all of her worries and exhaustion disappear, and was actually startled when Alex’s gaze lifted to meet hers, a smile splitting her face.

“Hey!” Alex said, getting to her feet.

“Hey,” Sam echoed with a small stumble at the end of the word, offering a smile in return. “You found the place okay?”

“Yeah, it was no problem,” Alex said. “It was on my way back from the morg—from…where I was doing some work, so it was super convenient.”

Ruby grabbed Alex’s hand almost before she got the sentence out. “Were you just about to say you were on your way back from a _morgue?”_ she asked, eyes wide. 

She’d always been _way_ too astute.

Alex shot Sam a nervous look, like she wasn’t sure how she should answer. Sam shrugged with a roll of her eyes.

“Babe, Alex is a federal agent,” she started to explain. 

“…Yeah. Yeah, there’s…lots of dead bodies in my line of work,” Alex said, taking her permission a little too far. When Sam caught her eye, she quickly added, “I mean not _lots._ Just…sometimes there’s…y’know, my job is actually to keep people safe so there _aren’t_ any dead bodies.” 

“But you were at a morgue today,” Ruby pointed out. “So I guess your job didn’t go that well.”

“Well, everyone has their off days,” Alex murmured, tugging a little uncomfortably at the hem of her jacket. “But on the plus side, I got to run a series of tests on these particular bodies to find out what happened to them so I can stop it from ever happening to anyone else.”

Ruby’s eyes widened. “Cool,” she said, frankly looking completely enamored with the idea.

Sam smiled to herself as she looked at them. It was rare that Ruby opened up to adults. Granted, Alex had been there for two major catastrophes in which Ruby had almost been _killed,_ but there was something else about her connection with Alex. Sam didn’t know Alex all that well beyond those few incidents and a couple run-ins at L-corp and two _very_ ridiculous game nights in which said federal agent had come close to murdering her co-worker Winn, but she liked her based on those few encounters. She liked how immediately she had taken to Ruby, and vice versa—and she couldn’t help but be a little intrigued by Alex’s work. Sam had accidentally overheard her on the phone with what she had to guess was Alex’s boss during one of those game nights, and from her tone, and the questions she was asking, it was clear she had an incredibly sharp, analytical mind. 

Add that to the fact that Lena had vouched for her as one of the most trustworthy people she knew, and the fact that Alex seemed to be an expert in purchasing very well-fitted leather jackets…well, Sam could think of worse people to have in her home right now.

“Well, I’ll leave you two to it,” Sam said, getting her thoughts back in order. She patted her hands over her clothes, making sure they were free of wrinkles. “Rubes, why don’t you go ahead and order some pizza for the two of you…”

“On it!” Ruby shouted over her, starting to take off for the number to the pizza place Sam had stuck to the fridge.

“Hey—hey!” Sam stopped her, holding out her arm. “Kiss first.”

Ruby rolled her eyes, but trudged over obediently, hugging her, and kissing her on the cheek, before resuming her journey to the kitchen.

Sam looked up to find Alex grinning at their exchange. “So—any rules or regulations I should know about before you go?” the other woman asked. “Any laws I need to enforce?”

That teasing look on her face was really something, Sam was having a hard time ignoring that. “Let’s see…in bed by nine,” she listed off, looking up so she wouldn’t have to focus on that teasing look too much. “No more than an hour of TV, and _one_ bowl of ice cream, no more—no matter _how_ much she begs you. Those puppy dog eyes are pretty killer, but if you can manage to resist them…”

“Got it covered,” Alex assured her. “No one has bigger puppy dog eyes than my sister. Trust me, I’m immune.”

Sam grinned at her, and Alex cocked her head, gaze fixing at the corner of her eye.

“You’ve got some, um,” Alex said, gesturing at the corner of her own eye, “a little eyeliner issue going on there.”

“Oh—shi—uh, crap,” Sam murmured, catching the swear before Ruby could hear. On the off chance she was actually listening. “The doorbell startled me when you got here and I smudged my eyeliner all over the place…”

“Oh no, I’m sorry!” Alex laughed. “Here, I can fix it for you if you want.”

Sam froze a little in surprise as Alex reached forward, hand cupping her face. The other woman looked a little surprised herself, like she’d reached forward without having fully thought things through. Seeming to decide there was no going back at this point though, she brushed her thumb along the corner of Sam’s eye, presumably evening the makeup out.

“Are you just making it worse so I make an ass out of myself in front of Lena’s business partners?” Sam asked, surprised to find a note of teasing in her own voice.

“Yup,” Alex confirmed seamlessly.

Sam smiled, finding herself pressing into Alex’s hand at her cheek. It was still a little cold from the outside, but strangely comforting nonetheless. That feeling of calm from before returned, and she held in a sigh, watching Alex’s eyes which were fixed sharply to their task. The other woman’s focus allowed Sam the chance to really look at her face, the sharp angles of it, the way her lips pressed together with concentration, as though this were some sort of life-saving surgery. She bit the inside of her cheek to keep herself from grinning at the thought, knowing that it would cause her eyes to crease, potentially undoing all of Alex’s work.

Alex finally took her hand away, fingertips brushing over to her hair for a moment. Her face turned very red all of a sudden, as if she’d caught herself doing it without having meant to, and she took a step back, hands returning to tug awkwardly at her leather jacket again.

“All fixed,” she said a little too brightly. “No one will ever know.”

“Thank you,” Sam said, feeling a strange, not-completely-unpleasant squirming sensation in the pit of her stomach. “Well, I’ll…I’m not sure how long this is going to go. Shouldn’t be later than ten, maybe ten-thirty.”

“Take however long you need,” Alex said. “Ruby’ll be in bed by nine, having watched no more than one hour of TV, and eating no more than one bowl of ice cream. It might be a very large bowl of ice cream, but there will only be one of it.”

“Good listening,” Sam approved with a smile, and Alex’s cheeks seemed to glow a little red.

“Also, I promise I’ll cool it with the FBI talk,” Alex added, lowering her voice. “No more morgue talk, no more dead gang banger talk.”

Sam tilted her head curiously, a little pinprick of cold snagging at her. “What did you say?” she asked sharply.

“Oh, that’s what I was at the morgue for,” Alex told her. “There was this whole thing last night…ten gang members found slaughtered down on the pier—kinda piled on top of each other. It was…honestly, it was pretty unsettling, even for me.”

“Ten,” Sam echoed as if in a daze, that pinprick of cold hooking into her gut and pulled it sickeningly downward as she pictured the scene she had woken up to this morning.

_Five bodies piled on top of each other, three more strewn out beside them, two broken and hanging over the edge of the dock._

_Ten bodies. Down at the pier._

“Yeah, we’ll stay away from that topic though,” Alex assured her. “I’ll stick to the rescuing kittens from trees stories for tonight. Promise.”

Sam managed a faint smile, or at least some sort of upward twitch of her lips…she hoped…but found she was incapable of speaking.

“You okay?” Alex asked with sudden concern, obviously catching her expression.

 _Yeah I’m good,_ Sam tried to say, but found her voice too hoarse to be heard. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Yeah I’m good,” she said. “You have—you have fun with Ruby. I’ll try not to be too late.”

She exited quickly after that, shutting the door behind her and sharply inhaling the cold air outside, trying to keep her legs from shaking.

She’d been so close. She’d been _so close_ to convincing herself that this morning wasn’t real. But she hadn’t watched the news today, hadn’t listened to it, hadn’t heard any of it…until now, from Alex. Ten bodies piled up on the pier. 

She’d been there. 

She just didn’t know why.


	2. Fortress

 

“Trap Leader to Bloodstone, Trap Leader to Bloodstone, do you copy?” Alex whispered anxiously into her comms. 

It’d been nothing but radio silence for the past three minutes, and she was starting to panic. She inched forward from her crouched position on the ground, poking her head around the corner quickly to be sure their target hadn’t fled; to her relief, the mechanical monster remained lurking behind the bush.

“The hostile is in sight, repeat, the hostile is _in sight,”_ she hissed. “Report status.”

She heard a loud cacophony of metal behind her, and cringed, afraid their cover had just been blown. Peeking around the corner again, she saw that the monstrosity they’d been hunting was on the move again, but still well within her sights as long as she could _get her new agent to respond._

“Repeat, _report status,”_ she hissed again.

Another barrage of loud clanging behind her, and then footsteps—not subtle ones—tracking away from her.

 _“Here!”_ she finally heard reported over the comm.

Alex rolled her eyes. Taking new agents on first missions was always interesting, but this was…just…something else altogether.

“Specify ‘here,’” Alex prompted.

 _“Oh—um…West,”_ the new agent said. _“West corner.”_

Alex peeked around her post at the East corner, heart picking up pace as she realized their target was headed straight West.

“Bloodstone, fall back,” Alex growled urgently. “Target’s on the move right toward your post, and it’s…”

She peeked one more time, confirming her fears as the monstrosity’s weapon glowed, powering up in what would be a deadly barrage of fire.

“…prepared to attack, repeat, the target’s weapons are _engaged and ready to fire,”_ she repeated anxiously.

 _“I can’t move,”_ the new agent told her, voice sounding panicked.

“What do you mean you can’t move?” Alex demanded.

 _“I’m stuck!”_ Bloodstone exclaimed.

Alex didn’t know what that meant, but she couldn’t see any other option but to move forward.

“Alright, stay where you are,” she ordered, “I’m on my way.”

It would put her in the direct line of fire, but damn it, she was going to keep her agent alive even if—

She sprang to her feet, letting out a yell, and frantically pulling the trigger of her uzi. It caught her target’s attention, and it pivoted on its base, loaded weapon opening fire at her. She managed to escape the barrage, sliding on her knees toward cover—

—only to be hit by an explosion of tiny missiles from the side.

…What the hell…?

She blinked in surprise as the pellets hit her, taking her off-guard enough that she couldn’t move out of the way quickly enough as a barrage of bullets hit her head-on—all coming from her agent who was charging at her with a piercing war cry, firing off bullet after bullet into her chest.

Alex’s eyes widened in shock and she collapsed.

“Ha! Double-crossed!” her agent proclaimed, standing over her.

“You…” Alex breathed, staring up blearily. “You betrayed me…”

“Bet you never saw _that_ coming!” her agent said triumphantly.

Alex clenched her teeth. “And I’ll bet…you never saw… _this_ coming!” she shouted, sitting up and grabbing her agent by the sides, beginning to tickle her mercilessly.

Ruby giggled hysterically in her arms, dropping her green and orange automatic rifle as she squirmed to escape Alex’s hold.

Alex grinned, finally releasing her and looking up as those strange pellets continued to hit her from the side. 

“What did you even—Ruby!” she exclaimed. “Is that _popcorn?”_

“If you cook it without a lid on the kernels explode,” Ruby informed her proudly. “It was my sneak attack. You never saw me coming.”

“I should’ve known never to let my guard down around someone as smart as you,” Alex admitted. “Although I’m pretty sure your mother’s going to murder me if we don’t get all this cleaned up. And—“

She winced as she heard a _thump_ from the hallway. 

“I think Max just hit a wall,” she said, getting to her feet and looking over to find that yes, in fact, their target—a Roomba that Alex had outfitted with several pillows and armed with a time-set nerf rifle—had indeed just smacked into a baseboard down the hall. “Alright, new mission, kiddo—you start picking up all the pellets, I’ll try to get all this popcorn picked up…and bring Max in here so I can disarm him. I don’t want him shooting at you. And if we’re lucky, your mom will never know I let you stay up till…” 

She looked over at the clock and grimaced inwardly. “9:45,” she finished. “Quick quick quick, Agent, that’s an order.”

She and Ruby scrambled to their tasks, Ruby rolling to the ground to gather the styrofoam bullets while humming what Alex was pretty sure was the _Mission Impossible_ theme song under her breath. Alex grinned to herself. She loved this kid.

They both froze as lights swerved in from the window—headlights, and then the sound of a motor cut off, and a car door being opened.

Oh shit.

“Abort mission!” Alex yelled toward Ruby. “Save yourself! Get in bed, I think your mom’s home!”

Ruby’s eyes widened, and she began to scamper for her room, but Alex held out her arm quickly.

“Agent Bloodstone,” she said seriously, “if this is the end, and your mother really does kill me, it’s been a pleasure working with you. Even though you double-crossed me.”

Ruby giggled, hugging her quickly. “She won’t kill you,” she assured her. “She thinks you’re really cool.”

Alex blinked a little stupidly as Ruby fled for her room. 

_Sam thought she was really cool._

She jumped up to her feet as the front door opened, bringing her hands behind her back to hide the fact that she was holding fistfuls of popcorn in each of them. Not that that was exactly hiding the way the rest of the living room and kitchen were trashed with many _more_ kernels of the stuff, not to mention styrofoam and suction cup bullets. 

“Hey,” she said in her most casual voice as Sam walked through the door and took in the scene before her.

Before Sam could get a word out, Max the Roomba came swiveling around the corner, and opened fire directly into her face. 

Alex started to rush forward to disarm him, but in the time it took for her to blink, Sam shoved the Roomba man up against the wall, tearing the nerf rifle from his hands, and snapped it in half.

Alex stared wide-eyed.

“Whoa. Remind me never to get on your bad side,” she murmured. Sam had just snapped that thing in half like it was nothing. Being a single mom…maybe she went all in for that strength training.

Sam wasn’t moving though. She was staring at the two pieces of the rifle in her hands, brow furrowed, and eyes strangely glazed. 

“Sam?” Alex ventured, taking a careful step forward. 

Sam’s gaze snapped up to hers and there was an odd fire there. Alex felt a sudden, unexpected bolt of trepidation hit her.

“Sorry,” she said quickly. “Ruby and I were playing—I tried to get this all cleaned up before you got home, but Ruby’s definitely…” she huffed out a nervous laugh. “She’s a pistol.”

Sam blinked once, then a few more times in rapid succession, and all of a sudden her expression cleared. 

“Ruby,” she murmured. “Right—“ She looked down at the broken pieces of the nerf rifle in her hands again, and looked shocked to see them, as if she hadn’t known they were there, and quickly put them down on the couch. 

“Sorry,” she said, shaking her head like she was trying to clear it. “I don’t know what…I guess I’m kind of jumpy…coming home at this hour, I’m just…on edge…”

“No, it’s fine,” Alex assured her, coming forward to pick up a few more styrofoam bullets. “I’m sorry I didn’t get this mess cleaned up before you got home. I wasn’t planning on having Max attack you.”

“Max?” Sam asked.

“The Roomba,” Alex said, pointing at the turned over mass of pillows that had once been stacked on top of the Roomba to bring it to a humanoid height. “Ruby and I were playing a little FBI game, and we needed a target so…I made Max. She and I weren’t actually able to take him down—looks like you did though, that’s…impressive.” She pointed at the two halves of the nerf rifle. “Definitely want you on my side if we do this again.”

She smiled at her appealingly, hoping some lightheartedness might convince Sam not to murder her.

It must have worked because she got a very exhausted-looking half-smile in return, and Sam started shrugging out of her jacket and toeing off her shoes.

“Well it sounds like you two had fun at least, Max’s attack aside,” she said. “Ruby’s in bed?”

“Oh yeah. Right at 9. Not a second later.”

“Mm-hm,” Sam said doubtfully, looking around at the smaller, but still very present mess of spilled ammunition. “So you’ve just been cleaning this up by yourself for the last 45 minutes.”

“It was quite the battle she and I had,” Alex said. “She turned on me at the last minute and set a trap for me using an uncovered pot of popcorn. I was defenseless.”

Full smile this time, wide, if still a little exhausted-looking. “Well thank you for putting up with such a horrible betrayal,” Sam said. “Who knew Ruby had a dark side?”

“Yeah, you can never tell with people—they can look all innocent, and then _bam!_ Darkness reigns.”

Sam’s smile slipped several notches, becoming tight, strangely uncomfortable. 

Crap. Always managing to say the wrong thing somehow, Danvers.

“But anyway,” Alex said quickly, trying to shift focus because _darkness reigns in your daughter_ was apparently not a good thing to say to a parent, “you should go put your feet up, and I’ll finish cleaning up in here. Do you want me to get you anything to drink? Did you eat? We’ve got some pizza left over, but not a whole lot…”

Sam’s smile returned, softer. “I’m fine,” she assured her. “I’m just going to get some water, I’ve just spent the last several hours talking to a bunch of very unpleasant men who think they’re somehow more qualified to run Lena’s business than she is.”

“I’ll get it for you,” Alex volunteered quickly. “Go sit down, let me get this place back in order for you.”

Sam gave in with a grateful expression, and Alex went to the sink to get her some water, picking up the last few bullets and missiles strewn out over the floor as she went along. When she returned to the couch with the water, Sam was leaned back, brow furrowed again as she stared at the broken nerf gun on the cushion beside her.

Alex sat down on her other side, handing the glass over. When Sam seemed too wrapped up in her own thoughts to have noticed, Alex scooted a little bit closer, clearing her throat to get Sam’s attention. Sam turned her head, looking almost surprised to see that Alex was sitting next to her. 

Well, Alex _had_ sat down pretty close. Probably too close. She wondered if she should scoot backwards a little, then decided that would draw attention to it and be even weirder, so she just kind of leaned away. Which was also probably weird.

If Sam thought so, she at least had enough sympathy for Alex’s awkwardness not to say anything, and simply took the glass of water from her. Her expression was grateful, but largely devoid of emotion beyond that. She was the very picture of exhaustion, and Alex felt pretty lousy for having just been responsible for a vicious nerf gun attack.

Fucking Max.

As if thinking along the same lines as Alex, Sam set her glass down and faced her fully, looking inquisitive.

“So. Why Max?” she asked.

Alex raised her eyebrows. “…Why…?”

“The name of your nerf-toting enemy,” Sam clarified. “Was it random, or is there someone in particular he was based off?”

“Oh—that,” Alex said, leaning her elbow on the back of the couch, and resting her cheek on her knuckles. “Yeah, I had a sleazeball Max in my life a little while ago…I never would have actually _shot_ him in the face, but…this was satisfying.”

“And what did Max do that was so sleazy?” Sam asked, and her curiosity seemed genuine. Like this actually had the potential to be a conversation between them about something other than Ruby.

“Oh—well actually, you’re big in the corporate world, you might know him better as Maxwell Lord,” Alex told her.

Sam’s eyebrows went up first in surprise, and then curved in the middle in annoyance. “I’m definitely familiar,” she said. “Sleazeball is definitely one word for him. All that hiding behind self-righteous bullshit. He’s so two-faced and hypocritical, he doesn’t even know it.”

 _“Exactly,”_ Alex said, grinning.

Sam reached for her glass again and took a small sip. “So what happened between you and the sleazeball that made you want to nerf gun him to death?” she asked.

“Almost too many things to count,” Alex said honestly. “Some of them are actually classified.”

“And the ones that aren’t classified?”

“He tried to wine and dine me.”

Sam laughed. “I see,” she said. She set the glass back down and shifted more comfortably on the couch, like she was honestly relaxing around Alex in a way that maybe she didn’t normally around other people. 

Or maybe Alex was imagining that.

Either way, it brought them close enough so their knees were touching. Not that that was the world’s sexiest thing to ever happen, but that patch of warmth at the point of contact was enough to make Alex’s heart leap a little.

“So I’m guessing you broke his heart,” Sam said, bringing her elbow up to rest on the back of the couch as well, so now they were both touching at the knees and the elbows. Again, not exactly a _take me right here right now_ gesture, but Alex was far from complaining.

“I don’t know about breaking his heart, but I definitely bruised his ego,” she said.

“No, I can see it happening,” Sam said with a conspiratorial smirk. “You definitely broke his heart.”

Alex felt her cheeks go red. “That sounded suspiciously like a compliment,” she managed to get out.

“Good,” Sam said, and Alex hoped she wasn’t just completely imagining that maybe Sam’s cheeks were a little glowy as well. “It was one. And…if I ever come across Max again in any of our meetings, I’ll make sure I have a nerf gun on hand to avenge your honor.”

Goddamn it. As if Alex didn’t already like her enough. She felt her grin slide into something that was probably ridiculously weird looking. Talk about heart breakers.

“I appreciate the sentiment,” she said, once she thought she could talk without making a fool out of herself. “But I think I might have to get you a new one before that’s possible. I mean, you seriously…” She pointed at the broken nerf rifle behind Sam. “Wow, right in half. That’s some Supergirl level strength you’ve got going on.”

Sam’s gaze snapped abruptly up to hers, eyes sharp, almost worried. “What did you just say?” she asked.

“Yeah, I could totally be in the presence of National City’s newest hero right now,” Alex teased, nudging her playfully. “You sure you don’t have some Kryptonian blood in you?”

She expected a laugh, a smile, even just one of those subtle upticks at the corners of Sam’s mouth. But Sam was frowning, lips pressed together. 

“Alex, I’m…I’m really sorry,” she said quietly, looking suddenly distracted, “I’m actually…I don’t mean to kick you out, but I’m just…really tired, so I think I’m going to head off to bed.”

Oh. That…was unexpected. And abrupt.

“Did I just say something…?” she asked, surprised.

Sam shook her head quickly. “No—not at all,” she assured her. “I just remembered how late it is, and I haven’t slept in pretty much an entire week…”

“You’re sure it wasn’t something I said?” Alex pressed. “I mean, I—“

“You’re fine,” Sam assured her again, giving a flash of a smile Alex wasn’t completely convinced was real.

She followed her to the door, picking up her jacket from the coat hanger and sliding it on.

Sam opened the door for her, but hesitated, keeping it closed enough that Alex couldn’t get through.

“Thanks for filling in tonight,” she said, almost like it was an apology. “I didn’t know what I was going to do when the babysitter canceled on me so last-minute…”

“Any time,” Alex said. “Honestly if you ever need me, I’m all yours.”

…Of all the fucking ways to have phrased that…

“For babysitting,” she specified quickly. “And I promise if we do this again, I’ll keep the shoot-outs to a minimum, and leave Max in the closet where he belongs.”

Ah, there. Alex got one more smile out of her. It was kind of curious, careful, and her head tilted the side along with it.

“When I’m feeling a little less like a slug,” Sam said slowly, “I’d love to take you to get coffee or something to thank you more properly.”

“Oh—uh, yeah, I mean, that’s totally not necessary,” Alex said reflexively. She almost kicked herself. Why the hell had she just said _no_ to that? She tugged nervously at the hem of her jacket to keep herself from reaching up and scratching the back of her neck. It was a reflexive habit she was trying to break so she was a little less obvious about her social discomforts. 

“But my sister’s having a holiday party this weekend,” she recovered quickly. “I’d love it if you came. I know Lena’ll be there, and me, I’ll be there, I can—well I can hang out with Ruby if you want to bring her, so you can relax.”

That wasn’t exactly what she’d meant to have come out just then. She’d been hoping to say something more along the lines of kind of asking her to come in a quasi date-like capacity, but had chickened out. Ruby was a good safety net though, a good shield, a good excuse. 

“Well, barring anymore attempted hostile takeovers at L-Corp, I don’t see why we couldn’t come,” Sam said thoughtfully.

“Cool,” Alex said, probably much too quickly. Her mind raced for a moment, trying to remember how specifically people said goodbye—was there a physical component to it? Was it weird if she did something like take Sam’s arm or something? Did anyone do that? 

She was having a hard time remembering social graces right now.

So she tugged on the hem of her jacket again and offered a sheepish looking grin. “Well. See you then,” she said.

Sam gave her a smile in lieu of an actual verbal answer, but Alex considered herself a winner tonight when Sam’s hand brushed down her arm and squeezed a little in farewell.

*

Exhausted as she was, sleep was the farthest thing from Sam’s mind as she watched Alex disappear from view. The house seemed so quiet and dark in her sudden absence. Sam almost wanted to call Alex back in, suddenly fearful of this aloneness.

At the same time, she didn’t want Alex here. What she had just said about Supergirl, about Kryptonians…Sam pressed her fingers hard to her head, and returned to the living room to get her glass of water. 

Ruby had said it, just days ago. What was it, that she had gone on a trip? It was a trip Sam hadn’t remembered, couldn’t remember, but something about Alex’s casual mention—Supergirl, Kryptonian blood…

She hissed in surprise as a sudden bolt of memory lanced through her—an image, almost unrecognizable, of giant spires of sand and dirt bursting up from the ground. Somewhere in the desert.

She swallowed hard as another memory split through her—the spires reaching up to the sky in tangles, forming something, a fortress…

“Your Fortress of Sanctuary,” a voice slithered into her skull. The small hairs on Sam’s arms stood up, fearful goosebumps spreading at the sound of it.

She held tight to her glass, like it could protect her, but there was something about the feel of it in her hand—

Another image crossed her vision, this one less frightening—something glowing. Something she was holding onto, following. A tool of some kind—some sort of green, glowing crystal—that was leading her to those spires.

Quickly, before some other image could flash before her eyes, she put her glass down on the counter, and padded over to her room. She didn’t know what that crystal was, but the image of it was so clear, she could feel exactly what it had been to hold it, jagged some places, smooth others, boiling hot the closer she got…

She searched frantically through her closet, through her dresser, under the bed, inside the pillow cases. Nowhere. No, she knew it was real, the image was becoming clearer and clearer the more she thought about it. Everything else was shrouded, confusing, she hated it, she felt lost. But this thing, this glowing… _thing_ , whatever it was…that was real, it was going to lead her somewhere, or tell her something, she knew it if she could just _find it…_

Her search became more frantic. It had to be here, she could almost feel it, the rough, crystalized stone. Something old, something that wasn’t from here, something that was teasing her, telling her _she_ wasn’t from here.

There was nothing. 

She stopped abruptly, standing in the middle of her room, realizing her breath was coming out harsh, near panting. There was a cold film of sweat on her forehead. What had she…?

She had torn her room apart. Clothes lay strewn wildly over every surface, drawers pulled out of the dresser themselves, lamps overturned as if the object she was looking for could somehow be hidden under them.

How had she not known how frantic—how nearly violent—her search was just now? She stared around the chaos she’d made, hands shaking.

“Mom?” she heard behind her.

She wheeled in place, red flashing across her vision so fast she almost didn’t see who had spoken.

“Mom?” came the voice again.

Sam blinked, her vision clearing slowly to reveal Ruby standing before her, eyes wide in concern. Not concern. Fear. Sam felt a wave of panic wash over her simply from the look Ruby was giving her.

She crouched down, holding her arm out to Ruby. Ruby was obviously tall enough now that she didn’t need Sam to crouch down in order to get to her, but Sam felt so desperately like she needed to be low to the ground, as non-threatening as she could possibly be at the look on her daughter’s face.

Ruby hesitated for too long, much too long, before finally coming to her, and wrapping her arms around her. Sam pressed her face into her, sighing deeply, trying to make her feel safe, trying to make her understand that _she_ was safe.

“I’m sorry, baby,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“What were you doing?” Ruby asked her, voice betraying the smallest hint of lingering fear.

“Nothing.” She pulled back so she could look up at Ruby, gripping her arms. She tried to force her gaze to be soft, to reassure Ruby that she had nothing to be scared of. “Nothing, I just…I was looking for something.”

“What is it?”

“Nothing,” Sam said again, shaking her head. “It’s not important.”

Ruby looked around, still frowning, but less fearful than before. “You trashed your room,” she said.

Sam turned her head, taking in the sight as well. “Sure did,” she breathed. She looked back up at her, trying to smile. “Guess it’s a sleep-on-the-couch kind of a night.”

Ruby’s eyes widened again, but it was with excitement this time rather than fear. “I could sleep out there with you,” she said. “We could get some sheets and sleeping bags and make a fort.”

Sam looked at her for a long time in surprise at the suggestion. They hadn’t done that since Ruby was much younger. Something twisted painfully in her as she realized Ruby was trying to wind her down, trying to make _her_ less afraid by bringing back this innocent thing they had done so many years ago. Ruby was so earnest—it was _almost_ heart warming, but it hurt that her daughter thought she needed to calm her down. It should never be like that. God, she’d really scared her. 

“As long as _you’re_ building the fort,” she said finally, and Ruby’s face lit up. “I’m going to go get ready for bed—construction’s on you.”

Ruby nodded, and they split ways, Sam going to the bathroom to scrub her face with cold water to get her senses back on track. 

When she made her way back out to the living room, she saw that Ruby had constructed one of the most amazing pillow-and-sheet forts she had ever seen. It was more of a tent, tall but snug-looking—and stable, unlike some of the ones she had made that inevitably ended up collapsing in on them.

“Wow,” she marveled, as Ruby emerged from it. “Is this some new skill you’ve been developing while I’ve been gone? This is amazing.”

“Alex taught me how to do it,” Ruby told her, and Sam’s heart warmed suddenly.

“Oh she did, did she?” Sam murmured.

“Yup. She knows how to do all kinds of stuff.” She gestured sweepingly at it. “Welcome to the Fortress of Sleep.”

Sam flinched at the use of the word _fortress._ And then inwardly pinched herself, because that was ridiculous. She couldn’t just shy away from words that reminded her of things that may or may not have been real.

So she grabbed her sleeping bag, wiggling in next to Ruby, and settling in comfortably.

Ruby turned over to face her, looking like a little caterpillar all snuggled inside her green bag. “I like when she’s here,” she said, like it was a secret.

“You like when who’s here?” Sam asked.

“Alex. We should have her around more often.”

“Hm,” Sam hummed, scooting in closer to properly snuggle her caterpillar child. She wasn’t going to say it out loud, but she agreed completely, and smiled to herself at the thought.

Warmed by the thought of Alex, and warmed by the caterpillar in her arms, she began to drift comfortably off to sleep. 

The only cold part of her was the hand she had untucked from under sleeping bag, where it clutched absently in search for that glowing crystal she was sure would lead her to her own Fortress of Sanctuary.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Literally everyone in this thing is a mess except Ruby. Little pint-sized caterpillar of wisdom.


	3. Giordano's

National City had seen its fair share of serial killers, but Alex couldn’t remember ever having seen or even heard of a killing spree of this magnitude in her entire life. The fact that J’onn agreed with her when she mentioned this was pretty horrifying; J’onn was this side of 350 years old. If this was honestly something he hadn’t seen before, then Alex could already tell they were in for something big.

For the past three nights, the DEO had heard chatter from their intel at the NCPD of various slaughters around the city. The first had been the ten gang bangers on the pier, which seemed like a huge undertaking in and of itself, but in the two nights following, that number increased to a total of forty-three.

“And we’re sure they’re all actually connected?” Kara asked as she, Alex, and J’onn made their way to the most recent crime scene the morning after the third attack. “It could just be random human-on-human violence. I mean, it’s the holidays. Yesterday I saw a ninety-year old woman try to beat a middle-aged man to death at the mall over the newest iPad. She wanted it for her grandson, and he wanted it for his wife. I had to pull them apart as Supergirl, but the second I touched her, the old woman started trying to beat _me_ to death. As _Supergirl._ ”

“The holidays do tend to bring out the worst in people,” Alex agreed. She looked up at J’onn. “Crime rate always skyrockets this time of year—are we sure these aren’t just isolated incidents?”

“I’ll let you determine that for yourself,” J’onn said flatly as they rounded the corner to the warehouse on the outskirts of town.

Alex’s hand flew to cover her mouth and nose as she took in the scene before them—partially to fend off the smell, partially from absolute shock. 

She hadn’t been there to actually _see_ the first in the string of these murders at the pier, she had only been shown pictures taken by the police when she went to examine the bodies at the morgue. The way they had been strewn out with some piled haphazardly on top of each other as if they’d been dropped from a great height and just happened to land that way was bizarre, and extremely unnerving. But it wasn’t until she had been able to examine the bodies themselves that she had become completely rattled. 

It had immediately become clear to her that this wasn’t simply the result of gang violence. There were no bullet holes to be seen, no stab wounds, not even evidence of physical beatings. The bodies were simply broken, some of them with near or even fully-detached limbs—as if someone had literally torn them apart. Some of them had grazes of singed flesh—whatever had caused it didn’t seem to have hit any of them full-on, it seemed to have missed by just a fraction.

Toxicology reports came back negative, save for two men severely hopped up on cheap street drugs, but they were just as torn apart and broken as the rest of the bodies. Besides, the drugs found in their system wouldn’t have accounted for the strength and speed it would have taken to rip apart that many men in so little time.

All of that had been plenty puzzling, and troubling, and had definitely confirmed J’onn’s suspicion that the perp was very likely alien, but Alex had assumed it would be an isolated incident.

As she looked across the massive parking lot, she realized how wrong she was.

_Twenty-six_ bodies lay strewn and piled across it, limbs, torsos, and necks bent in impossible directions.

“Holy shit,” she breathed. Kara seemed to have completely frozen.

“Now do you believe me?” J’onn asked.

Wordlessly, Alex snapped rubber gloves over her hands, and pulled her ID from her back pocket, flipping the switch to the FBI display. She held it up to the handful of detectives and deputies examining the scene and roping it off with yellow tape. Kara followed quickly on her heels, looking every bit the reporter she claimed to be. J’onn hung back somewhat, and Alex suspected he was probably sifting through the minds of the police gathered here for any information that might be useful.

Alex and Kara surveyed the scene slowly, walking amongst the bodies. Kara kept her hand pressed over her nose and mouth, and moved stiffly, like she was afraid. Neither of them had ever seen a massacre of this magnitude, but for Kara…

Alex reached behind her unthinkingly and took Kara’s hand, squeezing it comfortingly. She felt her little sister relax just the tiniest bit. It was one thing to rescue dozens, sometimes hundreds of humans at a time, but seeing this kind of carnage felt _wrong._ Kara shouldn’t have to see this.

“You okay?” Alex asked her softly. “You don’t have to be here, you know—this isn’t part of your job.”

“No, I want to be here,” Kara assured her quickly, voice only slightly edged with a squeak. She cleared her throat. “You said you found burned skin on some of the other victims, and Winn suggested it might be some sort of heat vision.”

“Do you think it’s Kryptonian?” Alex asked her.

Kara shook her head uncertainly. “As far as I know, Kal and I are the only Kryptonians left—I feel like we would have known by now if there were others like us. And Kal’s off-world right now, so it’s not like he was somehow involved. It’s gotta be something else.”

Alex nodded, and the two of them set about examining the bodies.

“It’s weird,” Alex murmured, “several of the bodies at the bottom of the piles have tattoos claiming them to different gangs, but these other ones…they just look like…”

“…Like random people,” Kara finished for her.

_“Rich_ random people,” Alex corrected, reaching down to examine tags on clothes, jewelry that would probably cost her six months rent to even _hope_ to pay off. “They don’t look like they were here when they were killed. They look like they were… _dropped_ here. Like literally _dropped_ from the sky _._ Look at the way their bones are broken.” She looked up, searching for where they might have dropped from.

“I recognize that one,” Kara said suddenly, eyes widening as she pointed at a man whose spine looked to have been twisted all the way around. “He was at Lena’s board meeting when I went to pick her up at work the other night.”

Alex frowned. “Do you recognize any of the others?” she asked.

Kara glanced around quickly, pulling her glasses down the bridge of her nose and squinting. At last she shook her head. “None of them.” She frowned. “But a lot of them have this… _oil…_ or something…on their hands, and some on their mouths. It’s like…” She squinted over them again. “I think it’s _pizza_ oil—yeah, it is! It’s from that place, what is it, it’s right by Lena’s apartment, just like a couple blocks west…oh! Giordano’s!”

Alex cocked her head. “You can tell _which_ pizza place it’s from?” she asked.

“Well yeah.”

_Well yeah._ Alex rolled her eyes. She knew Kara’s sense of smell was good enough to be able to sift through the rank, sickening odor of these people and separate the cause of smell out, but for her to know _specifically_ where a certain oil found on pizza came from…well, Kara did love her pizza. And she’d claimed to have had some from every single place in National City, so she probably knew her stuff.

“Alright, we should go check out that Giordano’s place,” Alex said. “There could be security cameras we can check out, see if anything shows up.”

Kara nodded, and they began making their way back through the carnage. They were almost clear, when suddenly a hand shot out, grabbing Alex’s ankle. She yelped in terror, gun in her hand in less than a second, and found herself pointing it down at one of the broken bodies. His skin was almost gray in pallor, and he whimpered in agony.

Still alive.

“Kara!” Alex exclaimed.

Kara’s eyes went wide for only a second before she caught Alex’s meaning, and fled to a secluded corner to change into Supergirl.

“J’onn!” Alex called urgently. “One of them is alive!”

A flurry of activity ensued, J’onn racing forward, three detectives close behind him. Supergirl reached them first, pulling the man free from the carnage.

“Get him to the hospital,” J’onn ordered quickly.

Kara sprang into the air with the man in her arms, disappearing wordlessly in the time it took for Alex to blink.

Alex shared a look with J’onn. With any luck, this man might be able to identify their killer.

In the meantime…Alex was going to make a quick pit stop at Giordano’s.

*

Giordano’s was far from Sam’s favorite pizza place, even though she found herself getting takeout from there just about any time she hung out with Lena and Kara. The pizza itself was good, but the place was stuffy, expensive, often frequented by shareholders of L-Corp who seemed ready to eat each other alive if it meant an extra penny in their wallets. Of course they all dined together, drank together, played nice with each other through sneers and backhanded compliments, but Sam was well aware of their true, selfish natures.

So, while happily indulging in the pizza so often provided by Kara and Lena, Sam always did her best to avoid this place completely. 

Today, however, she was on a mission.

She had woken this morning, blessedly, in her own house, in her own bed, with Ruby beside her. As far as she could tell, she hadn’t sleepwalked, didn’t have any unnerving blackouts or losses of memory from the day before…but she still had strange flashes of intensely vivid dreams. 

This stupid pizza parlor, of all places, was the first she could remember. 

It wasn’t all that strange that she had dreamed about it. She had been with Lena last night, and they’d passed it on the way to Kara’s. She had recognized a couple of the unpleasant people she’d had to deal with on Lena’s behalf strolling out of it, all of them waving goodbye to a man named Frank who was, quite possibly, the worst of them. Apparently, he had decided to stay at the bar to flirt with a waitress who looked desperately unhappy at the notion of having to keep dealing with him.

It was strange, Sam had felt a hard pull somewhere deep in her gut, something that had hooked into her and wanted to drag her over and hurt him somehow. On making eye contact with him through the window, that pull had flared, and the idea of hurting him didn’t just seem like a want, it seemed like the most important thing in the world—and then it occurred to her somewhere that hurting _him_ wouldn’t be enough, that somehow every single person in this establishment was guilty, just for being in his presence. 

It wasn’t until Lena said her name several times over to get her attention that she realized she was clenching her fists so hard that her fingernails had bitten bloody crescents into the palm of her hand.

Lena had looked at her in wide-eyed concern, but Sam had reassured her that she was fine, just tired.

_Just tired._

She wondered how many times she had said that over the last week. And true, she _was_ tired, but that wasn’t it. She felt drained, sometimes physically exhausted, confused, frustrated…and completely fixated on finding that crystal, the one she knew—she _knew—_ she’d held once and followed somewhere into the desert, somewhere where hard spires of sand sprung up, where there was pain, but also comfort. Quiet. Sense.

Worst of all, she had the feeling that she’d been there more than once, maybe even on the nights when she sleepwalked. She could never remember how to find it, or where even to find that artifact that would lead her to that fortress, but she was somehow certain that she made nightly visits there anyway.

Well she was determined to find her way there again, this time with waking awareness of it. With no one and no real information to guide her, she decided she was going to have to rely on her dreams—because they either _were_ dreams, or, like the morning she’d woken up on the pier, she was sleepwalking and witnessing things she had no right to witness, and that put her in danger, and could put Ruby in danger as well. So she’d follow the only clues she had.

Last night’s dream began at Giordano’s pizza parlor. There were screams, the scent of fear, of fire burning flesh, the memory of grappling with others, the feeling of wind stinging her face and her world spinning upside down as if she was being pitched through the air.

But all that she pushed to the side. First things first. Pizza.

Needing an excuse to go, she brought Ruby along, calling it a mother-daughter outing since she’d been so focused on work for the past few weeks. Ruby’s eyes lit up, and Sam felt a small pang of guilt that she was using this as an excuse for her own problems. Feeling like she needed to somehow make up for that, she held Ruby’s hand the entire way there, much to her daughter’s eventual annoyance, and bought her every item on the menu that she so much as mentioned looked good.

They chatted comfortably for awhile, but eventually Sam grew anxious to find clues as to what may or may not have happened here, so she excused herself to go to the bathroom. She’d barely made it across the floor when she turned to avoid a man with a baby carriage and ended up smacking right into someone else.

A someone else named Alex Danvers.

“Alex!” she exclaimed in surprise, hands gripping her shoulders to keep her from falling over.

“Sam!” the other woman exclaimed at almost the exact same time.

They both laughed, Sam letting go of of Alex’s shoulders and taking a small step back. She tucked her hair self-consciously behind her ear, offering a smile. “What are you doing here?” she asked. “Well, getting food obviously, sorry that was a stupid question…”

“I’m actually here on business,” Alex told her. She definitely did look more official than Sam remembered seeing her. Rather than her customary jeans and a leather jacket, she was currently in a suit more befitting of her status as a government agent, and…it was a surprisingly good look on her. A very good look.

“I’m sure you’ve seen on the news the last couple nights, all these…well, all these massacres pretty much,” Alex went on.

“I’ve actually been trying to ignore the news lately,” Sam admitted, clearing her throat. “I’ve had this weekend off, so I’ve sort of been Ruby-centric and not much else.”

“That’s probably good for your sanity,” Alex said, smiling. “But yeah, there’s been this crazy outbreak of violence lately. I’m just following up on a lead here.”

“Here?” Sam asked, a nervous knot forming in her stomach. “Here as in _here_ here?”

“Yeah,” Alex said with a slightly confused huff of a laugh at her outburst. “I mean you don’t have to worry, I’m pretty sure the danger’s past over here. But we found some evidence that it might have originated either in the restaurant, or just outside it, so I’ve been trying to take a look at security cameras around the area, see if I can find anything.”

A sudden wave of anger hit Sam and she felt a vital need to find whatever footage there was and destroy it. Destroy it any way possible. Crush it, burn it, get rid of it…

“Are you okay?” Alex asked, looking surprised, as though she had seen that anger wash over her.

“Were you able to find anything?” Sam asked sharply, rather than answering her.

Alex blinked. “No, actually,” she said, looking hesitant to tell her anything given her tone. “All the cameras around here were destroyed last evening, which kind of confirms our suspicions that it started here, but doesn’t do us a whole lot of good in identifying who was responsible.”

Sam sighed, hearing it come out of herself shaky, unsure if it was from relief, or nervousness.

“Seriously, I think it’s safe around here now,” Alex said earnestly.

Sam almost smiled. She wasn’t worried about whether it was safe here or not, but it was sweet that Alex was trying so hard to reassure her. Her mood lifted the tiniest bit.

“I know, I trust you,” she said. A beat of awkward silence passed between them, and she said quickly, “Listen, Ruby’s with me if you want to come have lunch with us?”

Alex’s gaze flitted over to where Ruby was, in fact, looking over at them, waving with a giant piece of pizza in her mouth. Alex smiled, eyes bright, and Sam felt both warm, and a little longing at that look. The other night, she’d hoped the two of them had just shared a conversation about something that _wasn’t_ her daughter, but it looked like Alex really only had eyes for Ruby. She probably liked Sam well enough as Ruby’s mom, but otherwise didn’t necessarily seem that interested. Friendly, and teasing, sure—but there was always a slight distance, and discomfort. She’d declined going for coffee with her, and when she’d invited her to her sister’s party…it had been with the offer of taking care of Ruby. The fact that she had a teasing sense of humor was probably just…her way. Sam guessed she had read into it as flirtation, had even attempted to flirt back, but it never seemed to actually go anywhere.

At least they had Ruby in common, though. Even if nothing else.

“I would absolutely love to,” Alex said, drawing her attention back. She looked regretful. “But I’ve gotta get back to work. Y’know. Saving lives and all that.”

Sam smiled, trying not to show that she was let down. “You’re a good person,” she said.

Alex’s face broke into a surprising grin. “I try my best,” she said. “I’ll see you tonight at my sister’s right?”

“I wouldn’t miss it,” Sam said, then remembered to add, “and Ruby too, obviously. We’ll both be there.”

“Cool.”

_That_ was it. It was the way Alex said _cool_ like she was an awkward teenager, accompanied by a smile that was just slightly insecure that made her so endearing. It almost undermined the suit, and Sam melted a little bit.

It wasn’t until Alex was gone that she remembered what she had come here for, and cold settled in her stomach again.

*

Alex looked herself hard in the face in front of her mirror that night.

“Tonight,” she told herself firmly, “you are going to talk to Sam like a human being. And you aren’t going to mention Ruby, or hide behind Ruby. You have a mouth, and a brain, and those two things can work at the same time. Women are not difficult to talk to. You are a woman. And you’re doing a perfectly good job talking to yourself.”

She sighed heavily. That wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

Raking her hair back with her fingers, she grabbed her jacket, and made her way over to Kara’s.

All the usual suspects were there—with the added presence of J’onn’s father, who seemed enamored with both hot chocolate, and the Christmas tree. James and Winn were fighting over the TV remote, and Alex very distinctly heard Winn hiss, “I help you with your crime-fighting Guardian escapades and this is how you repay me?”

Meanwhile, Kara and Lena were very much cozied up next to each other, sharing the same love seat and being generally, disgustingly adoring toward each other. Alex grimaced a little. She’d never really had the opportunity to truly get to know Lena all that well since Kara had her hands all over her at any given moment. She liked her well enough though—she just wanted to make sure she had the chance to suss her out a bit more at some point. Things definitely seemed to be getting serious between her and Kara—clearly, a shovel talk was in order. Was, in fact, long overdue.

Of course, from having seen them over the last year, she highly doubted Lena would ever do anything to hurt Kara, but she _did_ have a habit of holding multiple press conferences, the grand majority of which had _very_ nearly resulted in her dying. Several times. Alex just wanted to make sure Lena might cool it with the press conferences in the hopes that her sister wouldn’t develop an ulcer trying to protect her at every corner.

So maybe not a shovel talk. Like a spoon talk maybe. It was her responsibility after all.

Of course, she was going to have to arrange a second to actually get a word in to Lena without Kara’s hands all over her, so that might prove more difficult than was worth.

To her immense, disappointment, Sam hadn’t shown up. Hadn’t shown up _yet,_ she told herself. Sam had told her she wouldn’t miss it, that she’d definitely be here. And then Alex would talk to her.

Or she would panic and hang out solely with Ruby. Not that that was a bad thing by any means—but just…she’d really liked talking to Sam the other night after babysitting Ruby. It had even seemed to be going well until…something happened. Alex had mentioned something about Sam being as strong as Supergirl, just a joke since Sam had straight up _ripped a nerf gun in half_. She wasn’t sure if that had somehow hit a nerve, or if it was completely unrelated. Either way, it was weird.

But then Sam had offered to take her out for coffee, and Alex had been a dumbass and automatically declined before she’d even registered what Sam was saying. She was so used to keeping people at a distance, she did it subconsciously at this point, even to people that she did, in fact, want to be around.

She was so wrapped up in her own thoughts that when the doorbell rang, and she went to answer only to find Ruby and Sam standing there, she couldn’t quite remember how one greeted guests.

Fortunately for her, Sam started in immediately with frustrated apologies about phone conferences and cookies, practically barging through the door as if to make up for her lateness. 

It was kind of funny seeing her all flustered and rambling, but it also caused Alex to falter in her plans. The last thing this poor woman needed right now was to have to endure Alex’s pathetic attempts at flirting.

So she looped her arm around Ruby’s shoulder, and with a tip for Sam to get a drink of what Lena was calling “the good stuff,” led the girl away to play the role of babysitter again.

Ruby was lucky she was so damn cute and fun to hang out with, or Alex would start to feel bitter. As it was, she was mostly just bitter toward herself, and bitter toward whoever Sam had had that conference call with that had put her in such a frenzied mood. 

An hour sped by as Alex regaled Ruby with stories about Supergirl—and herself of course, because what would Supergirl be without a little help from Agent Danvers (at this, Ruby had laughed and said “Yeah right” so Alex had hit her with a pillow). Ruby did some of her own regaling—from the sound of things, middle school was just as shitty for her as it’d been for Alex back in the day.

Eventually, Ruby split from her to check out the smorgasbord Lena had painstakingly laid out, only to have Kara demolish basically the whole thing before guests had even started arriving. Lena had had to fight her off with a spatula.

“Good call,” Alex advised Ruby. “Get in there while you still can—my sister only has so much restraint.”

Alex watched her scamper off, then let her gaze drift over to where Sam was talking animatedly with Lena, rolling her eyes enough times that Alex was sure they must be talking about the nonsense they both had to put up with at L-Corp. Sam was ridiculously beautiful—she always was, of course, but it still managed to take Alex off-guard every time she saw her. 

Whatever.

Alex snatched up a beer and made her way over to the windows to look out over the city. It was nice and cool over here, just slightly removed from the rest of the party, the glass pane refreshingly cold when she leaned against it. She sighed through her nose, frustrated by her lack of courage. 

“Hey,” came a voice behind her.

Alex turned to see Sam walking over and then leaning one side against the window pane next to her, head tilted at Alex. 

“Hey,” Alex said back, a little uncertainly.

“Don’t shoot the messenger—but Kara sent me over here, saying that you look like a ‘weird awkward loner’ and someone needed to come over and talk to you,” Sam said, looking extremely apologetic. “Lena threatened to withhold all the wine unless _I_ did it.”

Alex glanced over Sam’s shoulder to see Kara at the counter, giving her a not-so-subtle thumbs-up. Lena swatted her shoulder to make her stop.

Great. So not only was Kara playing matchmaker, apparently Lena was, too. With Kara’s inability to keep secrets, it was most likely _everyone_ would know about Alex’s crush on Sam before the night was over.

She turned her attention back to Sam, who was smiling weakly at her. She held up her hands and offered apologetically, “Don’t shoot.”

Alex laughed, she couldn’t help it. “It’s fine, I don’t shoot messengers,” she said. “Sorry you were drafted, though.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” Sam shrugged. “Besides, I needed to come thank you for looking after Ruby _again.”_ She looked even more apologetic. “I know she can be kind of a handful.”

Alex raised her eyebrows. “Are you kidding?” she asked. “Ruby’s just about the most well-mannered kid I’ve ever met. She’s enthusiastic, but no—she’s not a handful. _I_ was a handful. _Kara_ was a handful.”

“Really,” Sam said, settling more comfortably against the window, one eyebrow cocked. “How so?”

“Well,” Alex said, flushing a little bit under Sam’s scrutiny, “when Kara first came to—when my parents first adopted her, it took us a little bit to get comfortable with each other, but once we did, we’d…well, we’d sneak out of the house all the time, going on our own adventures. Usually in the middle of the night. We were actually pretty inseparable for awhile. Then after my dad died, I kind of…I don’t know. We kind of drifted apart. Got in fights. Generally made life a pain in the ass for my mom.”

Sam nodded, brow crinkled with concern.

“But then in my senior year of high school, this kid we both knew was killed,” Alex went on, not sure why she was getting this personal. “We ended up both trying to figure out what happened to him—breaking _all_ kinds of rules in the process, by the way.”

Sam smiled.

“But we actually caught the guy in the end,” Alex said. “We were grounded for…the rest of the year,” she added, and Sam laughed. “But, y’know…it was the first crime I solved, so that was pretty cool.”

Sam was looking at her like…well actually, Alex really wasn’t sure how to classify the expression on her face. It was a good one though, it looked like. Soft. But also still somewhat impish for some reason. Whatever it was, she seemed to like that story.

Alex cleared her throat. “Anyway. Point of all that being…Ruby’s not a handful. She’s practically an angel. Except when she double-crossed me and shot me repeatedly in the chest with a nerf gun.”

Sam laughed from somewhere deep in her chest, kind of more of a hum. “Yes, well I’m actually still finding nerf pellets, and dart bullets, and all kinds of ammo here and there from your night together,” she said. “Or should I say, Max the roomba keeps finding them. We’ve had to perform emergency surgery on him several times to keep him from dying of indigestion.”

“Oh no,” Alex laughed. “Well y’know, in addition to being a federal agent, I’m an expert in physiology, so I could always come over and play doctor—“

Heat rushed up to her cheeks and she stuttered.

“—Not play doctor like _play doctor,_ like doctor, ‘cuz I’m a doctor—and the roomba—with the indigestion and the surgery—that kind of doctor—that was…I phrased that…that wasn’t not how I meant to phrase that.”

Sam was grinning at her, cheeks also bright red—either from embarrassment, or from how warm the room was, or maybe she drank too much, or maybe, possibly…

“No, I know what you meant,” Sam laughed, though there was a note of uncertainty in her voice, like she was maybe trying to read Alex somehow. Maybe trying to gauge if there was some truth in that poor wording.

Alex took a breath, remembering what she had told herself in the mirror earlier this evening, that she was going to do something about asking Sam out. And yes, she’d hesitated because of how frustrated Sam had seemed coming in through the door, but she looked more relaxed now, and Alex had made her laugh, and she was gorgeous and sweet…and if Alex didn’t act now, she probably never would.

So she licked her lips nervously and said, “Actually, sort of related—well, not _related,_ not related to the doctor thing but a little—not actually, but…just.” She huffed. “So, when you got back from your meeting the other night when I was babysitting, you kind of asked if I wanted to get coffee, and I said no—it was like a knee-jerk reaction, it’s not that I didn’t want to. So I was hoping to sort of redo that whole scenario, but do it right this time, and ask you if you wanted to go…Sam?”

She felt a cold wave of awkwardness hit her in the gut as she realized Sam wasn’t looking at her, didn’t even seem to have heard a word she’d just said. She was looking out the window, down at the street below, brow creasing slowly, a strange expression beginning to creep across her face.

“Sam?” Alex asked again, voice small with embarrassment. She looked down at the street as well, trying to see what Sam was looking at, but there was nothing there.

“Excuse me,” Sam murmured absently under her breath, then swept away, striding purposefully out the door of the loft.

Alex blinked in shock at Sam’s sudden disappearance, embarrassment twisting her stomach into knots. She doubted Sam had left because of what she’d said—she didn’t even seem to have been listening. Which made it all the more embarrassing. Alex may as well have been talking to herself. There was no way in hell she could imagine mustering up the courage to say anything like that again, she’d completely missed her shot.

She frowned as Ruby came over, brow crinkled in confusion.

“Where’d my mom go?” she asked.

Alex looked out the window, down at the street again, searching for whatever Sam had seen, or for Sam herself. Maybe she hadn’t seen anything. 

Alex shook her head. “I have no idea.”

*

Reign took her time washing the blood off herself.

It would have been easy enough to get it off quickly, but there was something satisfying about taking the time to admire the evidence of the work she’d done. Fourteen humans tonight, with nothing but corruption in their hearts—worthless, and a danger to what she was trying to accomplish. 

Not anymore.

It was nearly impossible to see the blood against the black of her armor, but there were stains of red on the exposed skin of her hands, crusted crimson caked under her fingernails, splashes and streaks of scarlet across her neck and face. It calmed her, brought clarity to her purpose, kept her from the muddied pull of her other self.

“You should remain in the Fortress tonight,” the hooded phantom of the AI who directed her actions urged. “There is no reason for you to return to the world of humans, you were not created to split your identity this way. You only make it more difficult for yourself returning to them each day.”

Reign exhaled slowly, trying to calm her annoyance before it took over.

“We’ve had this conversation,” she told the shadowed Kryptonian without looking at her, continuing to cup water to the back of her neck. “I don’t have control yet. Sam is a necessary evil for now. She’s my anchor. When I feel pulled toward her, I must become her. When she feels pulled to me, she must become me. If we resist each other, we’re both useless. Is that what you want?”

She turned slowly to level her gaze at the shadowed AI, one eyebrow raised critically.

The AI looked troubled. “Sam clouds your judgment,” she said. “The fact that you feel a _pull_ toward her at all is very disturbing. You don’t know what kind of corruption she has ties to.”

“If I’m pulled towards Sam, there’s a reason for it,” Reign snapped. “You’re the one who called me judgment, so trust mine. For all we know, she can lead us to where our help is most needed. She could very well be our key to success.”

It was clear the AI wasn’t pleased with her answer. “Or she could be your undoing,” she said lowly. “Especially when paired with the strength of her bond with that _error_ in her development. The child.”

Reign felt a sudden and agonizing stab of rage that wasn’t her own. She barely contained her hiss of pain, dreading that the AI would see it and deem it weakness. Mentions of Ruby always brought out Sam’s strength, and Reign had to fight to keep control.  

“I guess time will tell,” she said shortly. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to return to my life with the _error_ until tomorrow.”

She bowed her head sharply, ignoring as best she could the excruciating pull in her gut as Sam dragged her back to her world.

*

Alex tapped her finger anxiously on the lip of her water glass. It had been hours since Sam had disappeared. She’d called and texted her multiple times as the night crept over into the early hours of the morning, but heard nothing back.

Finally at 1 o’clock in the morning, she decided to take Ruby home and wait for Sam there. Ruby was in bed now, though it was hard to say if she’d actually gone to sleep yet. She’d been chewing on her bottom lip with worry ever since Sam had left, and Alex had had to warn her that at this rate she’d chew that lip right off completely by the time morning rolled around.

It bought her a split second of relief before Ruby was right back at it again.

Alex looked over at the clock on the microwave. Almost 2:30 now. Her brain was whirring with images of what could have happened—absolutely none of them pleasant. Never mind that there was someone out there killing by the dozens each night. God, what if something like that had happened to Sam?

No, she’d know it by now. She’d told Kara that Sam was still missing, and Kara had immediately taken to the skies to see if she could find her. Alex wanted to be out there looking herself, but she didn’t dare leave Ruby. She was just going to have to hope that the fact that she’d heard nothing from Kara yet was good news.

She jumped nearly right off the counter stool as the front door opened and Sam trudged through, slipping distractedly out of her jacket.

“Sam!” Alex exclaimed, coming forward. “Where’ve you been?”

Sam looked at her, expression…odd. She didn’t seem surprised to see Alex in her home, simply cocked her head at her, then continued to hang up her jacket, and take off her shoes. 

“I had somewhere I needed to be,” she said vaguely. 

“Well—“ That was a weird reaction. Alex would’ve at least expected a question about Ruby. Several, in fact.

She ran her fingers through her hair, unnerved by the lack of surprise or reaction from Sam. “Ruby and I were really worried about you,” she said finally. “I wasn’t sure if I should bring her here, or stay at Kara’s in case you went back there…”

Sam blinked slowly at her, eyes hooded. “You take good care of her,” she murmured.

“Well, I mean I wasn’t just gonna _leave_ her,” Alex said, trying as hard as she could to wrap her mind around how strange Sam was acting. She swallowed as Sam began walking toward her slowly. 

“Others would have,” Sam said, an uncomfortable bite to her tone. “Humans are generally selfish, and lazy, and uncaring.”

She drew closer, stopping only when she was mere inches from Alex. Alex’s heart pounded, looking back and forth between her eyes. She looked just the same as she had at the party earlier, there was no scent of alcohol on her breath, and she didn’t seem drugged either, just… _off._ Alex faltered a little bit, stepping backward to put just a small bit of space between them, but tripped back a little against the edge of the counter.

“But I don’t see those things in you,” Sam went on, voice like velvet. She lifted her hand up, fingers grazing up the zipper of Alex’s jacket. Alex gulped, feeling the edge of the counter digging into her lower back. “No, what I see in you is strength of character, a good heart. Rare in humans.”

Alex gulped again, mind racing to try to reconcile all these different things happening at once—her overwhelming worry over Sam’s disappearance, her confusion and frustration at Sam’s lack of explanation at her return, and now this…this invasive closeness that Alex would have wanted so much at any other time, but was now just too bewildered to comprehend…

Sam’s mouth was curved in a sly smile. “That sort of goodness deserves to be rewarded,” she purred, fingers leaving Alex’s jacket to come up and tuck her short hair behind her ear.

Alex felt heat wash over her entire body, eyes widening when those fingers slid back to tangle in the hair at the back of her neck.

“I mean, I don’t know about rewarded,” she stammered, “right, ‘cuz if you reward goodness, then is it really goodness ‘cuz then you’re doing it for a reward, not because it’s the right thing—“

Sam cut her off smoothly by pulling her into a kiss, humming salaciously against her lips. 

She separated from her slowly after a moment, letting their lips drag against each other as she pulled back.

Alex stared at her speechlessly, feeling heat rise high in her cheeks. Sam cocked an eyebrow, one corner of her mouth curling up in amusement.

“Why the look of shock?” she asked.

“I—nothing—just—earlier you—“

“Earlier I wasn’t feeling like myself,” Sam interrupted smoothly. “But now?” She leaned in, pressing her mouth against Alex’s ear. “Just tell me what you want,” she whispered.

Alex felt desire pool deep inside her, overwhelmed by the feeling of warm breath against her ear, the intoxicating scent of her perfume, the softness of her hair that Alex could bury her hands into if she wanted—or, more specifically, if she could find the motor skills to control her limbs.

Sam hummed out a laugh at her inability to speak, apparently deciding to take matters into her own hands as she cupped Alex’s face and crushed their lips together.

Alex made a muffled sound of surprise, hand flying automatically to Sam’s hip, squeezing. Sam hummed, seeming pleased with the reaction, deepening the kiss. Soft lips belied something darker, and more commanding, and Alex almost let herself get pulled into it—

But her head was spinning with too much confusion, and she pushed on Sam’s shoulders, pulling out of their kiss, and managing to breathe out, “Wait. Just…Sam.”

Sam blinked at her, and her brow creased, looking suddenly confused, almost as if she’d just realized something.

“Alex,” she murmured, before her eyes rolled back in her head and she dropped to the floor in a dead faint.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a long time to update! Trying to get back into a more predictable schedule, thanks for being patient!


	4. Dreams

Sam blinked her eyes open slowly, squinting as bright daylight streamed onto her pillow from the outside. She sat up slowly, pressing the palm of her hand to her forehead where a dull ache pulsed at her. She’d take it. At least she was in her own bed, not waking up on a pier somewhere.

It seemed late in the day for her to be waking up, though. She glanced over at the clock, frowning as she realized it read just past noon. Thank god it was a Sunday, but even still. She didn’t think she’d _ever_ slept this late.

Rubbing her eyes, she made her way to the kitchen, tiredly calling out, “Rubes?”

“With Kara,” a voice answered, and Sam jumped.

There at her table, dressed completely to the nines on a Sunday, was Lena Luthor with the Sunday paper, and a cup of coffee.

“Lena!” Sam exclaimed in surprise, quickly embarrassed by the fact that she was still in her pajamas.

…Actually, no. No, she wasn’t. She was still wearing clothes from last night, though extremely rumpled from sleep. Had she been _that_ tired after the party last night that she’d just passed out on her bed without changing?

“Am I missing something?” Sam asked. “Were we supposed to meet, or…?”

“I’m babysitting, actually,” Lena said.

Sam frowned, looking around. “I thought you said Ruby was with Kara…?”

“I’m babysitting _you,”_ Lena corrected with a gentle smile. She patted the table top. “Why don’t you sit down, I’ll get you some coffee.”

“I can…get my own…” Sam said slowly, still confused by Lena’s unexpected presence in her house. “I mean, I live here…”

“Sam.” Lena gave her a look, and pointed at the table. “Sit.”

Allowing her confusion and tiredness to submit to Lena’s instruction, she obeyed, watching as the other woman clipped over to the kitchen, pulling a mug out of the cabinet, and setting to work getting the coffee maker to wake up again.

“Am I allowed to ask _why_ you’re babysitting me?” Sam asked her.

Lena finished pouring the coffee into her cup and made her way back over to the table, setting it down in front of Sam, and then reclaiming the seat beside her.

“Alex called Kara this morning asking that someone come watch you and make sure you woke up just fine,” Lena said, clear eyes studying her carefully. “She said you had a fainting spell when you got home last night.”

Sam winced as a muddled memory swam across her vision, too blurry to make out completely. 

“Alex was here,” she murmured. 

“Yes. She said she’d debated taking you to the hospital, but ultimately decided you’d be fine with some rest—she was able to wake you up a couple times, get you to answer questions, she was able to get you to drink some water…”

Sam winced again as the memories cleared a little. Alex waking her up, Alex asking her if she’d had anything to eat, anything to drink, had she gone somewhere, was she aware of where she was. She’d asked her where she’d disappeared to during the party, and Sam hadn’t known how to answer, so she’d just said that she had forgotten something at work and had to go get it.

Alex had looked at her intensely then, dark eyes wide, but focused, brow drawn not just in concern but in concentration of her words, what she was saying, how she was saying it.

“And did you go anywhere else?” Alex had asked carefully. “Did you interact with anyone?”

And Sam had shaken her head, and just repeated what she’d been repeating for weeks now:

“I’m just tired.”

Alex had held her gaze for a long moment, then helped her up to bed. She’d had her drink several glasses of water—slowly—and then told her to sleep. Said she’d stay the night on the couch to be sure she was fine.

Sam’s heart warmed a little.

“Where is she now?” she asked Lena.

“She was called in to work,” Lena told her, eyes soft. Did Sam look so on edge that Lena thought she needed to soothe her with very decidedly calm expressions and actions? 

“Apparently she and her department were able to find a survivor of one of the attacks earlier this week,” Lena went on. “They got him to the hospital, but he was in pretty bad condition, comatose for the last several days. He only just woke up yesterday. Alex was called in to help interrogate him this morning.”

Sam rested her elbows on the table, pressing forehead down into her palms, trying to sift through her memories of last night. Unable to come up with anything solid, she lifted her head back up to find Lena continuing to watch her closely. She had an odd, suppressed smile on her lips.

“If it means anything, she left very _reluctantly,”_ Lena said, one eyebrow raised suggestively. “I think she would have much preferred to be here when you woke up.”

Sam pinched the bridge of her nose and decided to ignore that remark—and its accompanying tone and implication.

“What was she even doing here?” she wondered aloud, trying to come up with the memory, and falling short.

“When you didn’t come back to the party after you’d gone to get whatever it was you left at work,” Lena said, “she decided to take Ruby home and wait for you here."

Sam blew out a slow breath, shame washing over her. “I can’t believe I just…” She shook her head in bewilderment, feeling a stinging threat of tears in her eyes. “…I just… _left_ Ruby.”

Lena nodded. “We were all really worried about you, Sam,” she said. “What was it that held you up so long?”

“I just…” Sam racked her brain for an answer. Unable to come up with the actual memory, but unwilling to seem…incompetent…in front of Lena, she came up with as good an excuse as she could. “I went there to pick up a gift I’d gotten for Ruby…and then I saw some emails I must have missed…I guess time just got away from me.”

Lena nodded, but it was hard for Sam to tell whether she actually bought the story or not. “Well, you got our poor Agent Danvers in a complete panic,” she said, that suppressed smile back on her lips. “Apparently she made a call to _Supergirl_ to be on the lookout for you.”

Heat rushed up to Sam’s face, and flamed at the back of her neck, absolutely humiliated. “She had _Supergirl_ looking for me, really?” she asked.

“Mm-hm,” Lena confirmed. “You seem to be top priority for Alex.”

Sam stared at Lena in disbelief before an epiphany finally relieved her of her embarrassment, while simultaneously making her feel a little empty.

“Well sure, on behalf of Ruby,” she said. 

Lena tilted her head. “I’m sure Ruby was a factor,” she conceded, “but I’d say it’s mostly because she’s fairly smitten with _you._ So says Kara, anyway.”

And…the blush returned, the back of her neck hot enough that Sam felt suddenly uncomfortably itchy. “I think Kara needs to get her eyes checked,” she said, annoyed that her voice came out in a sort of mumble. “Alex totally adores Ruby, but with me…I don’t know…there’s a distance there. I mean she’s funny, and she’s sweet, and okay, completely charming, and badass but…definitely a little removed. Distant.”

“I think there’s _always_ a distance with Alex,” Lena said. “I mean _I_ don’t even know her all that well, and Kara and I have been together almost a year now. She’s very good at keeping people at an arm’s length, but Kara has assured me there’s no one more trustworthy than her. She also mentioned that Alex turns the color of a tomato every time she mentions you, so, arm’s length or not, don’t let that distance fool you.”

Lena leaned forward, mischief sparking in her eyes. “In fact,” she went on, “when Alex drops by to check on you, you might try turning on some charm of your own. You have the perfect fantasy situation, making excuses for Alex to come by and take care of you. In more ways than one.”

Sam snorted and shook her head, leaning her forehead back into her hand. “I guess I did get pretty damsel-in-distress on her if I was fainting in her arms,” she admitted with a self-deprecating huff of a laugh.

“Exactly,” Lena agreed with an approving grin. “God knows you could stand a little romance in your life—and coincidentally, I pretty distinctly remember _you_ changing color while talking about Alex one time with me and Kara. Just last night, in fact.”

Sam sputtered for a moment, only fueling that annoyingly _knowing_ look on Lena’s face, then scowled, because she absolutely could not deny that. 

*

Paul Vargas was not a pretty picture of a person. Of course the fluorescent lighting shining down at him from the hospital ceiling wasn’t doing him any favors. Neither was the fact that a good 75% of his body was sheathed in various casts in a desperate attempt to everything all attached.

Alex pulled up a chair beside his bed, while J’onn stood behind her with his arms crossed, ready to read whether Vargas would be telling them the truth or not. 

“Mr. Vargas,” Alex said in a short greeting. “I’m Special Agent Alex Danvers, and this is Director J’onn J’onzz. We were told you’re fit to answer some questions for us about the attack earlier this week, is that true?”

Vargas nodded carefully, and with what looked like great pain. He opened his mouth only very slightly to speak, and Alex noticed he was missing several teeth.

“Anything to bring that demon in,” he said through slow breaths of air. The words slurred together, but they were clear enough for Alex to make out after this many years of interrogating _aliens_ whose mouths were often structured differently than humans’. There wasn’t much she couldn’t understand at this point.

“I understand this might be difficult for you to talk about,” Alex said gently. “Unfortunately, you’re our only viable witness to this attack. Anyone else who saw it was watching from inside the buildings surrounding so they didn’t have a clear visual, and anyone else who was attacked…well, you’re the only survivor.”

A trickle of silent tears ran from Vargas’s reddened eyes.

“Any solid description you can provide us with would be a big help to us so we can make sure this never happens again,” Alex told him.

He was silent for a long time, not looking at her, then said finally, “A woman. Tall. Dark hair. Wearing a black mask. She came into Giordano’s.”

Alex scribbled the description on a notepad—more for show, than anything. J’onn could likely see everything this man was describing.

“Was she a patron?” she asked.

“No,” Vargas said. “She just…walked in. Made a, um, a B-line straight for the bar, for Frank Evans. We work together. He turned when she got close, confused. She grabbed him by the collar, and told him…told him her name was Reign, and that he had to pay for his sins, and lifted him up by his arm and just…swooped out.”

“Swooped out,” Alex echoed carefully. “How do you mean?”

“Warm night for December,” he recalled. “Sixty-five, maybe? Giordano’s’s got those giant windows from floor to ceiling. Some rich tourists came in, from way up north. Said it’s been in the negatives where they are the last couple weeks. Said sixty-five’s balmy, paid to have them open the windows. Just for a bit.”

Kind of rude, Alex thought.

“The woman grabbed Frank at the bar, and she flew, right through the open windows,” Paul went on. “Me and some others tried to chase after her. She had…I don’t know…I want to say these beams of light? Coming out her eyes. Shot us down. Then shot down others coming after.”

Alex frowned, and looked up at J’onn. That sounded very much like a Kryptonian. J’onn gave her a quick glance before returning his attention steadily at Vargas.

Vargas swallowed slowly. It looked dry, painful.

“It was so fast,” he said hoarsely. “Just…a slaughter. She picked up the bodies, and flew them, took several at a time. Some of us were still alive, though barely. She dropped us somewhere. Kept dropping more of us, dead piled on top of dead…”

Alex set her jaw as tears streamed down the man’s face. He looked like he was going to be sick. She almost reached out to take his hand and comfort him, only to be reminded that it was in a cast, having been shattered in the fall.

“Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Vargas,” she said quietly, and got to her feet. She wanted to say something comforting, but couldn’t quite see the worth in something as flimsy as, _I hope you feel better._ And in any case, he was now staring straight ahead, despondent. 

She and J’onn exited, nodding to one of the nurses who passed them to go into Vargas’s room.

“So she can fly, she’s super strong, and she was shooting ‘light beams’ out of her eyes,” Alex murmured, looking up at J’onn once they reached the parking lot beneath the hospital. “Sounds an awful lot like a Kryptonian to me. Were you able to get anything? Any images?”

“Nothing very clear,” he said, shaking his head. “He was right, the attack all happened so fast, it was hard to make sense of it all. But I did get a look at the woman when she walked up to his friend Frank at the bar.”

“You saw her face?”

“No, she had a mask. I’ll call up one of our sketch artists at the DEO, get a good reference visual for all of you.” He looked down at her. “You said you went to Giordano’s…there wasn’t any evidence of the attack?”

Alex shook her head. “None that they were letting show,” she said. “I’d have expected a lot more damage from what Vargas said, but if those windows were open, and most of the fighting took place outside on the street…I guess business is business and they didn’t want to shut the place down for something as trivial as a fucking slaughter.” She frowned bitterly. “I went to check all the security cameras there and at some of the surrounding stores, but they were all completely destroyed. I tried talking to eye witnesses, one of them showed me a video she took on her phone—useless. It was just a black blur, you couldn’t make out anything.”

J’onn exhaled harshly through his nose. “Not a lot to go on as far as finding her,” he said. “There’ve been other killings across the city all week, but not slaughters. Unless this Reign character is taking people down one by one in addition to these full-on massacres.”

Alex laughed darkly. “There’s no way to monitor every single crime committed in this city,” she said. “It’s way too big, and people are way too violent, even with Supergirl around.”

J’onn scratched his chin irritatedly. “I’m going to have to put her on patrol for the next couple nights,” he said. “She’s gonna have to take leave from work for at least a few days. I want her at the ready to engage with Reign at the first hint of her activities. I don’t want to have to wait for another slaughter to take place in order for us to find her.”

Alex nodded affirmatively. 

They walked in silence for a moment until they reached J’onn’s car, and Alex’s motorcycle beside it. Then J’onn sighed, sounding surprisingly exasperated.

 _“Alex,”_ he said with very sudden and extreme irritation.

“What?” she asked in alarm.

 _“Yes,”_ he said, “you’re free to go check on that Arias woman—it’s all you’ve been thinking about the entire time we’ve been walking. You’re making my head spin.”

Alex flushed red. “Well that’s _your_ fault for reading my mind!” she accused, jamming her hands in her pockets in humiliation. “Thought you’d’ve learned not to do that by now!”

“Oh I have, trust me,” he said with a dark, haunted look on his face, “but it’s hard to block out every single thing you think about, especially when you’re doing it so loudly, and so agitatedly. Forgive me for being curious.”

Alex glared up at him, trying very desperately not to picture anything that happened between Sam and herself last night.  J’onn was looking at her with no noticeable expression on his face, but that didn’t mean anything.

“Well…fine, I will then,” she mumbled finally, looking away, before adding in a near-inaudible grumble, “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” J’onn replied gruffly, continuing to look annoyed as he went for his car. He looked over his shoulder sternly at her. “Try not to do any of the scenarios you had playing in your head just now until you get to know her better.”

Alex blushed right down to her toes.

*

“No, remain seated, you’re ill,” Lena said to Sam as her doorbell rang. “I’ll get it.”

“I’m not _ill,”_ Sam said, rolling her eyes. “It’s my house, I can get the door.”

Lena lifted an eyebrow, but allowed her to get up from the couch, watching her every step of the way.

When Sam opened the door, she wasn’t exactly surprised to see Alex standing there, but she was surprised by what was clearly fly-away helmet hair that it looked like Alex had tried (and failed) to ruffle into some sort of presentable state.

Sam couldn’t quite suppress a laugh as she struggled to say, “Hi,” with at least some dignity to spare Alex’s pride.

“…Hi,” Alex replied, a hesitant smile trying to make its way across her face, halted by uncertainty at why Sam was laughing.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh,” Sam said through a final giggle. “You’ve just got quite a helmet hair situation going on right now.”

Alex’s hesitant smile turned into a grin, and she looked up as if she could see it, and ran her fingers through, trying to fix it. “Shit, I was trying to go for effortlessly windswept,” she said, only managing to make it much worse.

Unthinkingly, Sam reached forward to help her, biting her lip as she combed her fingers through soft, now somewhat tangled hair. She sighed out another laugh to distract herself from the unplanned intimacy, stepping back after a moment so she wouldn’t linger there too long. To her complete surprise, Alex’s gaze dipped to her mouth for a moment before flickering back up to her eyes, a sort of questioning look written in them.

Not sure exactly what to make of that, Sam gestured beyond the door. “You want to come inside?” she asked.

“No, I mean,” Alex said, and it sounded automatic, almost defensive. “I mean I don’t want to intrude, I was just checking to make sure you were alive…”

“Oh, she’s alive,” Sam heard Lena say from behind her. She looked over her shoulder to see Lena get up from the couch and come forward to join them at the door. “She’s going stir-crazy because I won’t let her do anything, but she immediately becomes obedient every time I mention that those are Doctor Danvers’ orders.”

Sam almost kicked Lena, but refrained incase that came off as an admonition of guilt. 

Alex fidgeted with an uncomfortable-sounding laugh, and Sam could practically _feel_ the smug smile on Lena’s face beside her.

“Well, good,” Alex said finally, “that’s good. You’re probably fine to be on your own now, so Lena I can drop you back at Kara’s if you want…”

“Actually,” Lena said quickly, “she’s not _all_ better.”

Sam frowned at her curiously.

“She told me she started feeling a little faint again about a half hour ago,” Lena went on.

…That wasn’t true at all.

“No I didn’t,” Sam said firmly, turning to Alex. “I’m fine, seriously.”

“Oh no, don’t be embarrassed by it,” Lena said brightly, putting her hand on Sam’s arm. She leaned in conspiratorially toward Alex. “Sam likes to pretend she’s invincible, but she’s still a little out of it. You might want to check her out, just to make sure?”

Sam ground her teeth with annoyance, realizing what Lena was up to.

Alex was looking at her earnestly though. “Yeah, of course,” she said. “I mean, if you’re still feeling woozy, we should probably have someone stay with you, at least until Ruby gets back. Lena you wouldn’t mind hanging out here a couple more hours with her, would you?”

“Actually,” Lena said, and Sam really had to try her hardest not to kick her, “you know, I just got a call in from one of L-Corp’s shareholders, so I’ve really got to be headed off. No rest for the wicked, you know, not even on a Sunday. Do you think you might be able to step in for me, Alex? You’d probably be much better at taking care of her than me anyway.”

Sam resisted the urge to face-palm at Lena’s very obvious set-up, but Alex, oblivious to it, was quick to accept the offer.

“Yeah, I mean I’m off work till tomorrow,” she said. “I just want to make sure you have someone on you for a full twenty-four hours since you passed out.”

“I agree, she absolutely needs someone _on her,”_ Lena said, with a very smug expression as she looked over at Sam. “And who better to do it than Doctor Danvers herself.”

That was it. Sam was going to resign from L-Corp and never have anything to do with anyone ever again.

She and Alex watched in somewhat awkward silence as Lena gathered her things and got her shoes and jacket on to leave. She kissed Sam on the cheek, gave Alex’s arm a friendly squeeze, then pranced out the door, looking infuriatingly proud of herself.

Sam was only too happy to slam the door shut after her.

She shook her head at Alex. “I really am fine,” she said. “You don’t have to hang out here, I’m afraid that was just…Lena being Lena.”

“No, I’m happy to,” Alex told her quickly. She seemed to be trying not to give in to her automatic tendency to immediately decline invitations, which was…extremely endearing. 

Sam smiled to herself and led the way over to the couch, plopping down comfortably on the cushions. Alex followed more uncertainly. She seemed like she was trying to gauge the situation somehow, sitting more on the edge of the couch, like she was ready to spring up and flee if she needed to. It would absolutely never cease to amaze Sam that a woman as brilliant and badass as Alex could be this fumblingly awkward in a social situation—while still managing to make it completely charming, and even sexy in a way.

“So,” Alex said, clearing her throat. That question of a half smile was back. “Last night was…?”

She trailed off, seeming to be hoping Sam could provide the right word for what last night was.

“It sure was,” Sam said, because she _also_ wasn’t quite sure how to describe things.

Alex cocked her head, seeming unable to judge what she meant by that. Which was fair, because Sam didn’t really know either.

“It’s cool if you don’t want to do it again,” Alex said. “I mean, if you want to, I’d be…I’d like that, but if you don’t, it’s fine.”

Sam blinked at her in confusion. “If I don’t…want to have another fainting spell?” she asked carefully.

“Oh—no, not that,” Alex said with a nervous laugh. “I wouldn’t imagine anyone would like to do that again. I meant the other part. Before.”

Sam creased her brow, not understanding.

“You know,” Alex said, voice going into a mumble. “When you kissed me.”

“When I…” Sam said before she could stop herself, jaw dropping in surprise.

Alex’s face went through a very intense transformation from completely white, to completely red. “You don’t…remember that, do you,” she murmured.

“No, I do—“ Sam said quickly. Which, she actually did, sort of. Now that Alex mentioned it. It was hazy, dreamlike, but she felt a real presence to that memory, it wasn’t like the senseless blur of her more violent dreams recently. No, she remembered something deeper in this, when she’d gotten home, and seen Alex there…what had she been feeling? She’d been feeling frustrated, some gut level of anger she didn’t have control over. But when she’d seen Alex, that frustration eased a little, she’d found her not just attractive, but…desirable. Like Alex was something to claim.

“I do—I do remember,” she heard herself say, pushing away the memory that almost didn’t quite feel like her own. She offered a smile she hoped seemed real. “I’m sorry, I’m just still kind of putting the pieces of last night together. I sort of thought I dreamed that.”

“Oh.” Alex looked uncertain, like she was teetering somewhere between disappointment, relief, and concern. She took a breath, eyes narrowing as she searched Sam’s face. She no longer looked uncomfortable, she looked like she was trying to analyze her. “I know I asked you this last night when I woke you up,” she said, “but just reassure me here—you’re not taking any prescription medication, right? Like anything new that might be affecting your memory? I know you said you didn’t go anywhere, or interact with anyone, and you definitely didn’t seem like you were intoxicated in any way, but, I don’t know…are there any prescriptions you take, anything that’s changed?”

Doctor Danvers indeed. She seemed more comfortable in this role, asking her concrete questions like this.

Sam shook her head. “I’m going to start sounding like a broken record,” she said, “but I really was just extremely tired. I’ve been working full tilt for the last several weeks, I think things just finally caught up to me.”

Alex studied her for a second longer, then drew back, looking mollified for the moment.

“I’m sorry you’ve been so tired,” she said. “I end up pulling some pretty crazy hours with my job too, so I know how disorienting that can get sometimes.”

“But have you fainted in any strong women’s arms lately?” Sam teased, lifting a playful eyebrow. “Because I think that’s the real litmus test for sleep deprivation.”

Alex laughed, genuinely this time. “Strong women’s arms, huh?” she said. 

“Well I don’t have any bruises or bumps on my head, so I’m assuming you caught me before I hit the ground,” Sam said.

Now Alex was grinning, seeming more confident now that they had found a lighter mood to play in. “Oh yeah. It was pretty heroic—straight out of a romance novel.”

Sam pursed her lips against a smile as Alex stuttered at her own wording.

“I mean, not _romance_ —although, to be fair, you did kiss me,” she pointed out once she’d gotten past the stutter. 

“Who’s to say I did it on purpose?” Sam asked, enjoying keeping her off-balance. “I thought I was dreaming, remember?”

Surprisingly, Alex grinned at the tease, but she looked down after a moment, pressing her lips together thoughtfully. “So,” she said, looking back up, “as far as dreams go, would you classify it as…a good dream? Bad dream? Mediocre? Weird?”

Her tone was still light in keeping with their teasing, but there was the smallest flicker of genuine insecurity in her eyes. It was a real question.

Sam shifted over on the couch so their knees touched, letting her gaze flicker down to Alex’s mouth for a moment before returning up to wide, dark eyes.

“You know, I don’t actually remember,” she said, drifting her fingers up to the left lapel of Alex’s jacket. “But given that I fainted right after you kissed me, I’m going to guess it was pretty good.”

Alex’s face broke into an absolutely ridiculous grin, and Sam leaned in almost without the conscious decision to do so, pressing her lips warmly to Alex’s.

Alex met her with surprising ease, a sharp inhale through her nose the only sign of surprise. They lingered at first touch for a moment, and then Alex lifted her hand to cup the back of Sam’s neck, pulling her in deeper. Sam wasn’t quite able to silence a small hum of pleasure as she slid half parted lips against Alex’s. She hadn’t been kissed like this in…well, years. Those toe-curlingly delicious kisses that sent warm sparks shooting across her skin, and spiraling into her lower belly…it felt like it had been forever since she’d had something like this.

She felt Alex begin to pull away, likely for a breath of air—but something deep inside Sam very much did not like that. She tangled her fingers in Alex’s hair and pulled her back in again, more roughly this time. Alex made a muffled sound of surprise and Sam hummed against her lips in response. 

And all of a sudden, there it was again, that strange, darker need deep in her gut. It spread through her, this hunger, this heat. Alex cared for people, she fought to protect people, she was exactly the way a human _should_ be, and she needed to be rewarded for that. She was worthy of everything, worthy of Sam, worthy of bringing about the future of this world…

Sam pulled Alex on top of her, giving into this darker hunger. Something was happening, something beyond this, and she intended to take Alex with her, humming with pleasure as she swiped her tongue against the seam of Alex’s lips. Alex opened up for her and she licked into her mouth, meeting Alex’s tongue with her own, the feeling sending heat straight down to her groin. Alex deserved this feeling, Sam thought, for the way she was. Alex deserved pleasure like this and Sam was going to make sure she was well provided for…

Alex pulled up though, this time succeeding in separating from her, though she remained leaning over her. She licked her lips, out of breath, and Sam stared up at her, a foreign frustration in this separation taking root deep inside her.

But Alex offered a smile through her panted breath. “That was…” she began, then pushed herself up. Sam followed her, that frustration nagging heavily at her. “We should probably slow down a little,” Alex went on. “I think Ruby and Kara should be showing up any minute now.”

Sam searched her eyes. They were sparkling—she hadn’t pulled away because she wasn’t enjoying it, if anything she looked this side of giddy. It had just been too much too soon.

Sam blinked, a sudden clarity coming to her, pulling her from her darker, more hungry haze. That lopsided smile was back on Alex’s lips, and Sam felt lighter somehow. 

“I’m sorry,” she said, shaking her head to clear it. “I just…I got really carried away there, wow.”

“Trust me, I’m not complaining,” Alex laughed breathlessly. “I’m just a little…”

“It was too fast,” Sam agreed quickly. God, what the hell had that been? That wasn’t like her at all—and that sudden possessiveness? The mood had changed so quickly from tingling warmth to…whatever that was, wherever that had come from.

“It was a _little_ fast,” Alex said. That smile was still there. She looked sort of… _pleased_ with herself, actually, which was every kind of endearing. Every second of looking at her like this was bringing Sam slowly back to reality. “Mostly I just don’t love the idea of having my sister and your daughter walking in on…this. Might scar us all for life.”

Sam laughed. That darkness was gone. Whatever that hunger had been, it had vanished, and she breathed in deeply, relieved. All that was left was her own, brighter excitement, lingering pleasure and nervous giddiness flooding through her at the thrill of being with Alex.

“Good instincts,” she conceded. “There’d be no recovering from that.” She cleared her throat, combing back her hair with her fingers, realizing she was still just a little bit breathless. “So. Slower.”

“A little bit slower,” Alex said. “Maybe…going to a movie after work tomorrow or something?”

“That sounds good,” Sam agreed. “Though—nothing scary. Kara told me you love horror movies, but I have been having some _very_ bad dreams lately. I don’t need both of those things at once.”

Alex sighed dramatically. “You’re no fun. And anyway, I’d like to think that I might’ve just provided some fodder for _good_ dreams tonight.”

Sam scoffed—or tried to, although it turned into more of a laugh than anything else. Apparently a very brief almost-makeout was all it took for Alex’s confidence to skyrocket. Good information to know for later.

“Maybe a little,” Sam gave in finally. “There might be _one_ possible good dream with your name on it. _Maybe.”_

Alex was grinning again, and Sam couldn’t help but lean in for just a very quick peck.

They ended up settling on the couch and watching mindless TV until they heard Kara and Ruby approaching the front door. Alex stole one more kiss while they had the chance, then got to her feet to greet them at the door. Sam watched her, a warm contentment settling over her as she did. 

That dark hunger was still gone for now, but a distant part of Sam couldn’t shake the feeling that it would come back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reign needs to learn how to share and wait her turn. There's plenty of Agent/Doctor Danvers to go around


	5. Good Distractions

Perched on the roof of the building across from Catco, Reign felt a certain sense of peace shrouded in the darkness of this chilly night. Her target, a fairly non-descript middle-aged man she knew through Sam’s memories to be suspected of embezzlement at L-Corp, had gone inside the building for a moment. He would reappear at any moment in the street below, she knew. And then he’d be hers.

Sam hadn’t made any accusations over his suspected embezzling because she didn’t have the proof required to go to other humans to take him down. She was smart that way, at least. Sam had been keeping tabs on his every move for over a week now, waiting for the slightest slip-up so that she could alert Lena to his actions and allow the human laws to take over from there.

Reign knew better. Sam was smart enough, but she was painfully naive if she actually thought human laws could bring any true justice—and for a man as obscenely wealthy as this, human laws may as well not exist at all.

Fortunately, Reign was not bound by the flimsy, easily-corrupted human system. She understood that true justice needed to be final and absolute. And what could possibly embody those two things more than death?

So she waited, patiently, for him to reemerge. She’d had to be more careful these past few days—her more ambitious attacks on these sinful beings were beginning to attract more powerful attention than simple human law enforcers, such as they were. Supergirl being the main one.

Reign was certain Supergirl would not be able to defeat her in an out-and-out fight, but her attentions at present would be unwanted. They could hinder her greater goal. For right now, Reign needed to go about things with a more delicate touch, singling out those with money and power who had done wrong first. Once she had eradicated them, she could allow chaos to shake up the rest of the world. But not yet. She needed to be strategic, to make careful choices. And not just choices about who should be brought to justice, but also about who was worthy of surviving beyond this point, of being part of the Awakening.

Sam had provided her with at least one potential such survivor, the human Alex Danvers. 

This wasn’t to say that Alex’s worthiness was iron-clad. Reign had been witnessing an unsettling pattern with regards to herself and Sam—namely that sometimes the lines between the human and herself blurred. Already, Reign had a distant interest in the safety of Sam’s child. Children as a general rule were not Reign’s targets—they were void of the sin most adults carried with them. But feelings of protectiveness were not part of Reign’s purpose. Those feelings were Sam’s, she knew, but that didn’t necessarily mean they were _wrong._ Sam’s instincts thus far had proven relatively adequate, and if Reign took interest in Ruby’s wellbeing, it didn’t detract from her greater goal.

But Alex was a potential problem. Reign didn’t trust herself to be able to judge this particular human accurately, because she was unclear whether that judgment was being influenced by Sam’s infatuation with her. And if Reign couldn’t trust her own judgment…well that defeated her entire purpose. She _was_ judgment. The slightest blurring of her perception rendered her useless. She may as well not even exist.

In time, she thought to herself, Sam would wear down, become weak, and Reign would be able to take over completely. At such time, she would be able to make a more accurate judgment when it came to Alex, and the rest of the humans circulating Sam’s life. And then she would deal with them all accordingly. 

In the meantime, it wasn’t entirely objectionable to indulge in Sam’s infatuation with Alex. After all, if Sam was right, and Alex truly was this paradigm for what a human should be, then Alex needed to be encouraged to remain that way. Goodness deserved to be rewarded, Reign could certainly allow that.

She stretched her shoulders luxuriously as she caught sight of her target reemerging from Catco and onto the empty street below. Satisfied with the conclusions she’d drawn, and eager to continue carrying out her task, she dropped gracefully, silently from her perch, and dove toward her prey.

*

“Well I can’t say I ever had any particularly good feelings about him,” Sam said as she took in Alex’s story about an L-Corp employee having been killed outside Catco the night before. “I’m actually pretty sure he was trying to pull some kind of embezzlement scheme. But I would never have wished _that_ upon him.”

“Yeah,” Alex agreed, taking a sip of her beer. She ran her fingers through her hair and the light from the dim lamps in the bar caught the undercurrents of red. “We’re still trying to figure out how exactly _that_ could have happened. Breaking his body apart like that, I mean. One of his arms was found completely detached from his body.”

Sam regarded her for a moment with a lifted eyebrow. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever chatted with someone about dismemberment on a first date before,” she said.

Alex laughed. “Right. Sorry,” she said. She cleared her throat, and Sam saw her squirm a little against the back of the booth to get more comfortable. “I haven’t exactly… _dated…_ anyone for a long time. I forgot murder cases aren’t the best getting-to-know-you topics.”

Sam smiled. “It’s definitely an interesting flirting technique.”

“How am I doing otherwise?” Alex asked. “My movie choice wasn’t too bad, right? It wasn’t a horror movie at least.”

Sam hummed, warmed by the teasing glint in Alex’s eyes. “It was hard for me to judge,” she said. “Someone kept distracting me for most of it.”

“What? Who was distracting you?” Alex asked, eyes comically wide.

Sam laughed. “I’m preeeetty sure it was the FBI agent who kept kissing me every time she got bored.”

“Oh _her,”_ Alex said with an exaggerated eye-roll. “She’s the worst.”

Sam grinned, looking down to keep the giddy flush of her cheeks at least slightly hidden. She liked this, how comfortably teasing Alex was. Of course making out with her in the back of a dark movie theater like they were a couple of teenagers had probably boosted her ego quite a bit. Sam bit into her lip at the memory.

Alex was…a very good kisser. A very good kisser who apparently got extremely bored with artsy romantic comedies and did her best to stave off her boredom by honing those kissing skills on Sam. Many times. Starting off slow, then deepening, then _really_ deepening, with her fingers buried in soft hair, mussing it so it would be the ruffled mess Sam loved the look of on her…she was glad the theater was so dark, and the volume of the movie was so high, so no one could hear the hungry moans and hums which spilled from her as she parted her lips eagerly for Alex.

Then the two of them would come up for air, settling down for a few minutes to actually catch a little bit of the movie, before Alex would get bored again and the whole thing started over. Sam’s entire body was practically vibrating with excited pleasure by the time the movie was done, and she’d gripped Alex’s hand hard in hers as they made their way to the bar they were currently tucked into. 

“It wasn’t so bad,” Sam said, corner of her mouth lifting as she pulled her attention back to the present. “I’ve definitely had _worse_ distractions. Several.”

“Really,” Alex said, eyebrows perking up curiously. 

“Well maybe not _several,”_ Sam amended. “I really haven’t dated much at all since Ruby. Here and there, but nothing serious. Ruby’s never really liked anyone I’ve tried to date, so it was hard to get that enthused. Regardless—as far as distractions go, you’re one of the better ones.”

Alex ran her fingers through her hair again with a self-conscious grin. “So…is this something you might want to do again?” she asked.

Sam swirled her straw around in her milkshake and hummed in mock contemplation. “Well, I guess if you promise to keep the dismemberment talk to a minimum, I might consider it,” she told her.

“Oof—no promises, my only real pickup lines are all about dismemberment,” Alex said. “But I can at least try to keep my mouth shut on the ride home.”

“The ride home?” Sam asked, eyebrows lifting.

“Yeah—I mean, my motorcycle’s parked a couple blocks from here, then you don’t have to pay for a taxi and…youuuu look kind of apprehensive,” Alex trailed off.

 Sam pressed her lips together uncomfortably. Apprehensive was one word for it. 

“I’m just…honestly motorcycles look like a deadly accident waiting to happen,” she confessed. “In my own little fantasy world, riding on a motorcycle sounds awesome, but the reality of it is…scary.”

“It’s not so scary,” Alex assured her. “I’ve got a helmet for you so we can both have matching helmet hair when we get back to your place…”

Sam smiled.

“…And I’ll go slow,” Alex added. “Like…30 slow. It won’t be as badass, but that’s okay.”

Sam held her breath for a long moment, then finally let it out, giving in. “Fine,” she said. “But if we crash and I die, I will haunt you for the rest of your life.”

“We won’t crash,” Alex said. “I promise. I’ll keep you safe.”

There was something surprisingly heavy and sincere in her tone when she said that, and Sam nodded. 

The two of them finished up their drinks and paid their bill, then exited to the street where Alex took her hand to walk down to where her motorcycle was parked. Sam knew next to nothing about motorcycles, but seeing Alex swing her leg over and sit astride it with her leather jacket and her somewhat cocky expression…this did sort of play out a teenage fantasy of hers that was awfully tempting.

She took the helmet Alex held out for her, then straddled the bike behind her, wrapping her arms tightly around Alex’s waist. Alright, so this was becoming more and more a teenage fantasy with each second. Sam bit her lip, and shifted impossibly closer against Alex’s back, resting her head against Alex’s shoulder. She inhaled deeply, smelling the leather of Alex’s jacket, combined with the sweet scent of the small patch of exposed skin on Alex’s neck. If not for the helmets, she’d have buried her face into the crook of Alex’s neck and kissed her there, nuzzling into her hair as they rode along, shifting them both against the vibrations of the bike beneath them.

As it was, she angled her head as best she could so she wasn’t knocking her helmet into Alex’s, and hugged her waist for dear life. True to her word though, Alex went slow, and Sam felt a warm wave of safety wash over her. And holding her this close and this tight with the wind blowing gently over her skin…Sam would probably do this again in a heartbeat.

*

There were several ways Alex had imagined this date ending. The unrealistic one, obviously, was the one where she and Sam had sex for hours on end until they could barely move anymore. Obviously that wasn’t going to happen given that Ruby was there, but it had been a nice thought.

The more realistic one was the kiss-on-the-doorstep thing with awkward smiling and muttering and stumbling over making plans for a second date. Which is what happened. To an extent.

Sam had just turned to go inside after all that when Alex spied a long, rectangular object about the size of glass bottle peaking out from one of the bushes underneath the window. It was glowing a strange blue-green, casting eerie shadows around it.

“Hey,” Alex said before Sam could go inside. She crouched and picked the object up, finding its surface jagged and rough, like some sort of rock. Crystalized something, it was hard to say. She held it up for Sam to see. “Do you know what this is?”

Sam’s expression slipped into something that almost looked fearful. Fearful—but also concentrated, demanding.…even slightly obsessive. Her entire focus seemed to have completely zeroed in on whatever this thing was in less than a second.

“Sam?” Alex asked, uncertain what that look was. “Are you okay?”

Sam lifted her gaze quickly to Alex’s face and she shook her head with a smile. “Sorry, I’ve just—I’ve been looking for that,” she said. “For…a while, actually.”

“What is it?” Alex asked, looking down at it. There were symbols carved into the sides of it that weren’t glowing. She squinted, trying to make them out.

“Just—“ Sam said, voice sharp. She whipped her hand out, and snatched the thing out of Alex’s grip.

Alex stared at her in surprise.

“It’s nothing,” Sam breathed, shaking her head. She offered another smile. “It’s…Ruby’s, she’s been looking for it. Some toy or game or something, I’m not sure.”

Alex searched her eyes. She wasn’t completely sure Sam was telling the truth, but whatever this was, it was clearly important to her. Alex guessed it really wasn’t her place to press for more details. God knew she had her own personal stuff she wouldn’t want someone giving her the third degree about—it definitely wasn’t her place to pry.

“Well…okay,” she gave in a little awkwardly. “I’ll um, see you later then.”

“Alex,” Sam said quickly as she turned away. She stood there, holding the object awkwardly, looking almost lost. She chewed on her lower lip. “Just…text me when you get home, okay? So I know you got back safe.”

Alex smiled, relieved by the more normal expression on her face, the sweeter sentiment. Sam pulled her in quickly and kissed her goodnight again, somewhat apologetically it seemed, for her odd outburst. Alex relaxed into the kiss, then pulled away slowly after a moment. Sam’s hands were at her waist, the glowing object pressed into her hip. Alex squinted again at those symbols, wondering vaguely why they looked so familiar as Sam kissed her cheek one more time.

It wasn’t until hours later, after she’d gotten home, showered, and went to bed, that she woke up with a startling realization. Those symbols on the glowing object weren’t just senseless shapes. That was Kryptonese writing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kinda short chapter this time but things are gonna start ramping up soon... ;)


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